Chapter titles like “Stop? Drop? Enroll?” and “Let My Pupil Go” characterize this Ph.D.-turned-standup-comedian’s cleverly caustic account of graduate school.

Today’s questions focus on what happens after the program, specifically on how Ruben got his book published and on why he decided not to become a professor after earning his degree.

Adam Ruben earned a PhD in molecular biology from Johns Hopkins University while enjoying a side career as a stand-up comic. The outcome of his career is not just his dissertation, but also the book “Surviving Your Stupid Stupid Decision to Go to Grad School.” Adam took the time to answer our many questions. Read on for advice on the proper care and feeding of advisors, including how to handle professors when they are in a party mood.

While most doctoral programs have some sort of orientation, the focus on such matters as required courses, time to degree and dissertation goals may diminish opportunities to consider really important matters — such as how to wander into a colloquium at which food is served, timing your entrance so you don’t need to listen to the talk.

[Listen to the podcast.]

An affable biologist double-dips his chips for TV science.

Popular Intersession course teaches students the art of stand-up.

Ruben is a fifth-year biology graduate student who, for the last two years, has taught an Intersession course titled The Stand-Up Comic in Society. Think of it as sort of a thinking person’s stand-up comedy boot camp.

Adam Ruben, a fifth-year graduate biology student and a stand-up comedian, teaches the intersession course, The Stand-Up Comic in Society.

If you’d like to read an article that does for the Baltimore comedy scene what HBO’s The Wire does for the Charm City in general, take a peek at this profile of Johns Hopkins student and part-time stand-up comic Adam Ruben!

Grad student and funnyman Adam Ruben is out to do biology by day, comedy by night.

Kaufmann’s Tavern is serving up an amusing entree these days – comedy.