A low temperature hydrothermal synthesis route has been proposed to the direct production of high purity trigonal selenium nanowires using selenite and thiosulfate salts as starting materials. By choosing different reducing agent, the diameter of the products can be selectively controlled in the range of 10-60 nm. The selenium nanowires synthesized by the present method are free from any catalyst or template, which is beneficial to the future use in related applications. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.