The Master-designate of Adams House made his show-biz debut last night.

William Liller, Robert Wheeler Wilson Professor of Applied Astronomy, showed up on the Johnny Carson Tonight Show to discuss pulsars, radio signals from outer space that may indicate the existence of other-wordly intelligent life.

Liller followed Terence Stamp and mini-mini-skirted Barbara Ferris onto the NBO show, which originates in New York. Before his appearance, Carson kept flubbing the pronounciation of Liller's name.

"This is a full professor from Harvard University-this is no dummy," the Fantastic Johnny C. said, in introducing his final guest.

Once on, Liller performed an old Nat Sci 2 crowd-pleaser on Carson. Sitting the comedian on a piano stool with two weights in his hands, he spun Carson around on stage, demonstrating how Carson speeded up with the weights close to his chest and slowed down when they were farther away.

Carson claimed to be an amateur astronomy bug himself. At the conclusion of his discussion he told Liller, "Once you get into this subject, you leave everybody saying 'What did they just say?'"

"Sorry about that," Liller murmured.