Before graduating this spring from UNT's Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science, Helen Xiong and Kevin Chen were named 2013 Barry M. Goldwater Scholars, a prestigious honor for students planning careers in mathematics, science and engineering. UNT leads all Texas universities, with 52 scholars, to date.

Xiong researched polymer brittleness and nanocomposites under Witold Brostow, Regents Professor of materials science and engineering and director of UNT's Laboratory for Advanced Polymers and Optimized Materials. She plans to study chemical engineering or physics at Stanford University this fall.

Chen worked with Xiaotu Ma, research scientist of molecular and cell biology at the University of Texas at Dallas, and Adi Gazdar, professor of pathology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, to develop a new statistical tool for cancer data analysis. He will study molecular biophysics and biochemistry at Yale University in the fall.