Mahir Saleh Hussein, a renowned Brazilian/Iraqi physicist, passed away on 16 May 2019 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. He left behind an indelible legacy for the Brazilian nuclear physics community that extends beyond the scientific community. Mahir had a long and distinguished career, working on several topics in theoretical physics, such as nuclear reactions, exotic nuclei, accelerator physics, quantum chaos mesoscopic systems, and Bose-Einstein condensation.Mahir was born on 21 November 1944 in Baghdad, Iraq. He kept his Iraqi citizenship throughout his life because of his beautiful memories of a childhood and adolescence. In Iraq, he attended public schools in several districts of Baghdad. In 1964-1965, he enrolled in the College of Science in the University of Baghdad, becoming the first graduate student of the University of Baghdad in 1965. His dream was to hold a Ph.D.