He moved to Saint Petersburg to serve as a mathematical assistant to Leonhard Euler from 1773–1783, and remained there until his death.

From 1800–1826, Fuss served as the permanent secretary to the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg.

Pauline Fuss, a daughter of Nicolas and Albertine, married Russian chemist Genrikh Struve.

Nicolas's son Paul Heinrich Fuss (1798–1855)[2] edited the first attempt at a collected works of Euler.

[2] Nicolas's son Georg Albert (1806–1854),[2] was from 1839 an astronomer in Pulkovo and then from 1848 in Vilnius and also published on magnetism.