Mavis Louisa Freeman (30 January 1907 – 1992) was an Australian bacteriologist and biochemist. She assisted Macfarlane Burnet in identifying the source of Q fever.

Mavis Louisa Freeman was born in Ballarat, Victoria on 30 January 1907 to Louisa (née Lutzen) and Harry Stanley Freeman.^[1] She completed her primary education at Esperance Girls' School, Brighton where she was dux of classes III and IV.^[2][3] She then attended Firbank Girls' Grammar School where she was dux of the school in 1924.^[4] On leaving school she won a scholarship to Trinity College^[5] at the University of Melbourne from which she graduated with a BSc in 1928.^[6]

Freeman's first job was at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute where she was employed as a research fellow. Her work included studying snake venoms with Charles Kellaway and proteins with biochemist H. F. Holden.^[7]

In 1934 she won the Victorian Women Graduates' Association Travelling Scholarship and went to London to continue her studies at the Lister Institute.^[8] She returned to the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute and, in 1939, assisted Macfarlane Burnet in the discovery of the source of Q fever.^[9]

In World War II she was appointed as pathologist to the Second Australian Hospital, A.I.F. in Palestine and was the only woman to serve overseas, other than nurses and masseuses.^[10][11]

Freeman returned to the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute after the war but resigned in 1948 and moved to Adelaide to work at the Institute of Medical and Veterinary Research.^[12] She completed an MSc at the University of Melbourne in 1950.^[13][14]

Freeman died in Malvern, Victoria in 1992.^[1]