Many people have poked fun at Vice President Joe Biden. But at the 2010 Radio and Television Correspondents Association Dinner in Washington, D.C., there was something decidedly unique about the person roasting Biden.

“I actually read your autobiography,” comedian Joe Wong told Biden. “Today, I see you. I think the book is much better.”

Wong has performed on American talk shows and hosts his own TV show in ChinaJoe Wong

It wasn’t the jokes or the straitlaced delivery that stood out but rather the fact that Wong isn’t your typical comedian. He has an advanced degree in biochemistry, something that none of the previous hosts of the swanky black-tie event, including Wayne Brady and Don Imus, can lay claim to.

How did a Chinese immigrant who once studied neurotransmitters in fruit flies wind up on stage telling jokes at the expense of the second-highest ranking U.S. official? According to Wong, delivering jokes and getting data have more in common than one would think.

“In science, you have to fail so many times,” he says. “I’ve learned to deal with failure. That’s very important. A lot of people try stand-up comedy. They do a bunch of jokes, and if things didn’t work out, they get really frustrated. They give up.”

Wong readily acknowledges that the transition from biochemist to comedian is “not very direct.” Growing up in mainland China, Wong recalls, “I grasped American humor early for some reason.” He counted Woody Allen and George Carlin among his comedy idols.

While in college in China, Wong says, “Some of my classmates were trying to read jokes off Reader’s Digest. They understood every word in the joke. But they didn’t understand why it was so funny. I had to explain to them why this joke was funny.”

Though his adeptness at American humor may have set him apart from his Chinese peers, Wong stuck to a more traditional career path at first. He enrolled at the Chinese Academy of Sciences to study molecular biology and in 1994 moved to the U.S. as a graduate student at Rice University. After earning his Ph.D. in 2000, Wong joined a startup company that didn’t survive long, so he next moved to Boston for a job at Sanofi Aventis.

The change of scenery gave Wong the chance to “explore different things and hobbies,” as he puts it. “I played a little golf. Then I took a stand-up comedy class.” With that class, a change in careers began. Wong fine-tuned his routines in clubs around Boston, struggling to get noticed. “After you do this for about seven or eight years, gradually, you know your own style, and at that point, it’s a little bit easier,” he says.

His perseverance paid off in 2010 when Wong was named Boston Comedian of the Year and won recognition at the Great American Comedy Festival.