I am a postdoctoral research associate at the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics (DPMMS), University of Cambridge, working with Julia Wolf. Previously, I was a PhD student at the University of Leeds, supervised by Pantelis Eleftheriou and Vincenzo Mantova.
My research is in interactions between model theory (a branch of mathematical logic) and combinatorics. Model theory provides a beautiful framework to study diverse mathematical objects from a foundational, structural point of view. I am particularly interested in the model-theoretic setting of distality and finding tame combinatorial behaviour within. Conversely, I am also interested in using combinatorial intuition to guide developments in distality and related settings. My latest pet endeavour is to develop the theories of higher-arity distality and hypergraph distality by using each to inform the other.
Email: hwmt3 (at) cam (dot) ac (dot) uk
2. Zarankiewicz bounds from distal regularity lemma
(Submitted) | arXiv (2025)
1. Distal expansions of Presburger arithmetic by a sparse predicate
Journal of Symbolic Logic (2025) | arXiv (2024)
1. Can you explain distality to me like I'm five?
No.
2. Pretty please?
Imagine your mummy and daddy buy you a first-order logical structure. 'It's too messy,' you complain. 'I can't describe the φ-types uniformly!' Since mummy and daddy love you, they buy you a new structure that is distal, and you gallop to the blackboard to play with your well-behaved toy.
3. What is a 'Ho Wang'?
I am from Hong Kong, and my Chinese name 湯顥泓 is transliterated (from its Cantonese pronunciation) as Tong Ho Wang, which is why Ho Wang appears in my name here and there.
4. Why do your papers say 'Soli Deo Gloria'?
That is Latin for 'glory to God alone'. I am always grateful that God has made maths so beautiful and has given me a brain to appreciate it! Psalm 8 describes this sentiment beautifully.