"We called them visitors," he deadpans. An associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at Georgia Tech, Ludovice's irreverent observational humor has been his trademark among students for the past dozen years.

Over the past two years, he has sought a wider audience for his "nerd comedy" as a stand-up comic at nightclubs and corporate meetings. This second career has earned the professor a special name of his own: Dr. Ludicrous, a stage name purportedly bestowed by students over unrealistic expectations on a statistics test.

"Teaching and comedy go hand in hand," Ludovice explains. "I like to teach, and I think anyone who enjoys teaching is probably also a natural-born ham."

It also could be argued that anyone who devotes research time to computer simulation to elucidate the relationship between atomic level structure and the properties of synthetic and biological macromolecules, as Ludovice does, needs a good laugh now and then.

Ludovice's dozens of performances include headlining at annual meetings of the American Chemical Society and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and stints at clubs throughout the Southeast, including the Punchline in Sandy Springs, Ga.

One of Ludovice's best-known routines is called "Pocket Protectors and Other Fashion Statements" — despite the fact that pocket protectors have pretty much gone the way of slide rules.

"There's only one faculty member at Georgia Tech who wears them: Jim Powers in organic chemistry," Ludovice says. "The first time I used one in my act, I borrowed one from him because I didn't have any of my own. I actually have to special order them."

Although self-deprecating nerd humor is his stock-in-trade, Ludovice will perform just about anywhere. In fact, one of the most difficult aspects of stage comedy is picking the right material for the audience. He learned that tough lesson while performing at Under the Couch, a student-run cafe in the basement of the Couch Building.

"I got up and told a George Bush joke," he recalls two years after the fact. "It was a relatively innocuous joke. It wasn't even all that insulting. And I got booed by 19-year-old college students — that's just not supposed to happen!

"Comics are going to make fun of whoever is in power, and right now the Republicans are in power," he says. "I'd write jokes about the Democrats' platform and policies — if they actually had some."

Ludovice keeps polishing and delivering his comedy wherever there's a stage and a microphone, hoping for the day he'll get a call from Exxon or DuPont asking him to perform at their shareholders meeting. But in the meantime, he says, "I'm not going to quit my day job anytime soon."

©2006 Georgia Tech Alumni Association