Dr Mark Wong is an incoming Australian Research Council DECRA Fellow at the University of Sydney and a National Geographic Explorer. Originally from Singapore, Mark is an entomologist whose research on ecological communities, functional traits, and ecosystem functioning explores the causes and consequences of biodiversity change from local to global scales. His findings have been featured by National Geographic, BBC, NBC, Forbes, Newsweek, Live Science, The Conversation and other international media.

Mark earned his DPhil in Zoology at the University of Oxford as a Clarendon Scholar. His doctoral work advanced functional trait-based approaches in insect ecology and applied them to uncover the drivers and impacts of ant invasions in tropical Asia. Following Oxford, Mark led a global synthesis at the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research in Zurich, revealing how human activities are reshaping species and trait diversity across ecosystems, from grasslands and forests to lakes and streams. Mark then joined the University of Western Australia as a Forrest Fellow, where he led a study mapping the human-mediated spread of ant species worldwide, uncovering global invasion hotspots. He also produced a global meta-analysis showing that insect activity rises by approximately 30% during the night, underscoring the significance of conserving nocturnal environments for biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.

A passionate myrmecologist, Mark has described several new species of ants – including the subterranean Leptanilla voldemort – and co-authored a landmark study estimating that Earth is home to 20 quadrillion ants, whose biomass exceeds that of all wild birds and mammals combined.

Mark serves on the editorial boards of Insect Conservation and Diversity and Asian Myrmecology. He is also guest-editing special issues on invertebrate invasions (Cambridge Prisms: Extinction) and nocturnal ecology (BMC Ecology and Evolution).