The Penn Vet Working Dog Center serves as a national research and development center and training center for scent detection dogs. Here, unlike most programs, puppies enter the program at 8 weeks of age and go through foundation training to enhance search, confidence, persistence and physical fitness. In the 3 years of the PVWDC, we have had 33 dogs complete the program, of which 30 dogs have working careers. Our dogs are trained ( with only positive reinforcement) to find victims of disasters, detect explosives and narcotics, apprehend criminals, and conduct search & rescue missions. Some dogs are Diabetic alert Dogs and others are trained for ovarian cancer detection. These dogs literally save lives!