Octavia Harris, a retired U.S. Navy command master chief petty officer, has been named chairwoman of the Department of Veterans Affairs‘ Advisory Committee on Women Veterans.

Harris will lead an expert panel that will offer policy and legislative recommendations to VA Secretary David Shulkin on matters and programs that affect female veterans and their families, VA said Tuesday.

“As VA continues to work toward modernization, the committee’s guidance will assist the department in meeting the important and evolving needs of women veterans,” said Shulkin.

The department also elected four new committee members that include Moses McIntosh, a retired U.S. Army chief warrant officer; Yareli Mendoza, a U.S. Air Force veteran; Keronica Richardson, an Army veteran; and Wanda Wright, a retired Air Force colonel who serves as director of Arizona’s Department of Veterans Services.

VA also extended the appointments of current committee members Kailyn Bobb, an Air Force Veteran, and Janet West, a Navy commander.

President Donald Trump’s administration and lawmakers are scheduled to return to Washington this week to address a series of issues that Congress kicked into 2018 in order to pass a tax reform measure in 2017, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.

Hogan Gidley, a spokesman for the White House, said Mick Mulvaney, director of the Office of Management and Budget, is set to meet with congressional leaders Wednesday to reach an agreement on immigration and spending.

One of the contentious matters that lawmakers need to deal with is the demand for higher defense budget.

Congressional negotiators intend to strike a budget deal that would authorize a $200 billion increase in federal discretionary spending in the next two years.

Other issues legislators need to address this month include the Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act; Obamacare subsidies; the Children’s Health Insurance Program; hurricane relief; and federal debt ceiling, the report added.

Congress passed in December a four-week continuing resolution that is set to expire on Jan. 19 and must clear a spending package to avert another government shutdown.

The Department of Homeland Security‘s science and technology directorate has collaborated with the Federal Aviation Administration and the U.S. Army to create a simulator technology designed to test explosive vulnerabilities in aircraft.

The Aircraft Explosive Testing Simulator is designed for repeated explosive tests and built through S&T’s Commercial Aircraft Vulnerability and Mitigation program, DHS said Dec. 20.

“Lack of availability of new generation composite commercial aircraft structures for use in destructive explosive testing necessitated development of alternate test methods and tools,” said Nelson Carey, CAVM program manager.

“Doing so is essential to provide S&T and its U.S. government customers with accurate and efficient methods for conducting commercial aircraft explosive vulnerability assessments,” Carey added.

The simulator features a steel cylinder with an opening to accommodate composite test panels for installation and trial.

DHS noted that composite test panels are supplied through an interagency agreement with FAA and the agency’s National Institute for Aviation Research.

CAVM researchers plan to collect and use from the tests in order to determine the susceptibility of composite-based commercial aircraft structure to internal explosive threats from terrorists.

The Army Research Laboratory uses test data from S&T in efforts to produce numerical analysis models and tools that will work to simulate a composite structure’s response to threats.

CAVM also deployed the simulator tool during a series of tests with S&T’s Transportation Security Laboratory, the Defense Department, Transportation Security Administration, FAA and the French alternative energies and atomic energy commission.