Dan Brouillette, former senior vice president and public policy lead at the United Services Automobile Association, has taken his oath of office as deputy secretary of the Energy Department.

DOE said Tuesday Brouillette brings three decades of experience in the public and private sector, including roles in senior management teams, to his new position.

Brouillette previously worked at Ford Motor Company as a vice president in charge of domestic policy teams as well as a member of the automaker’s North American Operating Committee.

“I look forward to welcoming Dan back to the agency and utilizing his private sector management expertise as we work together to carry out the missions of the DOE,” said Energy Secretary Rick Perry.

Brouillette served as assistant secretary of energy for congressional and intergovernmental affairs during the administration of George W. Bush.

He was also a chief of staff to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce as well as a member of the Louisiana State Mineral and Energy Board.

David DeVries, chief information officer at the Office of Personnel Management, will step down from his current role and leave the government in the coming weeks, FedScoop reported Tuesday.

The report said Rob Leahy, deputy chief information officer at OPM, will serve as an interim replacement to DeVries upon his resignation.

DeVries assumed the position in August 2016 and helped modernize the agency’s information technology infrastructure and business systems, consolidated data centers and supported the development of the agency’s cybersecurity posture.

Before OPM, he held the roles of principal deputy CIO, acting CIO and deputy CIO for information enterprise at the Defense Department.

NASA will install cameras and science data processing computers for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology-built Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite onto an Orbital ATK spacecraft in the coming weeks following the platform’s completion of a systems integration review.

The space agency said Saturday that independent technical and scientific experts reviewed the TESS platform which will be launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in March 2018 to search for exoplanets that orbit stars outside the solar system.

TESS will use four wide-field cameras to scan the sky and monitor transit events as well as survey stars approximately 100 times brighter than the ones observed during NASA’s Kepler mission.

NASA noted that TESS will also observe areas that overlap with the future James Webb Space Telescope‘s optimal viewing zone to help locate potential exoplanet candidates that will be studied for detailed characterization.

The Astrophysics division at NASA HQ oversees the TESS Explorer-class mission which the space agency will conduct alongside MIT’s Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, the Goddard Space Flight Center, the Ames Research Center, Orbital ATK, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and the Space Telescope Science Institute.

Stephen Rice, deputy chief information officer at the Department of Homeland Security, will assume the role of acting DHS CIO on Sept. 1, FCW reported Monday.

He will succeed Richard Staropoli, who will leave DHS after three months in the CIO position.

Rice previously served as assistant administrator for the Transportation Security Administration‘s Office of Information Technology and Chief Information Officer.

Before that, he was deputy CIO and assistant administrator at TSA for more than four years.

He also spent nearly 10 years at the U.S. Secret Service, then left the federal law enforcement agency for a stint as a network consultant in the private sector.

Rice then returned to the federal government as a Commerce Department security program manager and later joined TSA.

The Department of Homeland Security has selected Arizona State University to lead a consortium of academic, industry, government and laboratory partners that aims to optimize DHS’ operational efficiency.

DHS said Monday the new Center of Excellence for Accelerating Operational Efficiency’s will receive $3.9 million to fund its first year of operations in a 10-year grant period.

“As lead institution, Arizona State University will spearhead a consortium of academic, industry, government, and laboratory partners throughout the country to develop advanced analytic tools and technologies,” said Matthew Clark, director of DHS science and technology directorate’s office of university programs.

William Bryan, DHS acting under secretary for science and technology, said CAOE will use analytical tools to help DHS components and other security practitioners boost their operational efficiency.

The center’s research efforts will focus on data analytics; economics; homeland security risk analysis; and operations research and systems analysis.

CAOE will also assist DHS leaders in policy analysis and work with DHS components in the development of tools and technologies that can help achieve measurable efficiency improvements.

DHS COEs are led by U.S. academic institutions and are comprised of researchers and educators that work with DHS agencies to address homeland security challenges.