Porous alumina templates (AAO) has attracted significant interest due to the fact that they are readily fabricated through a simple procedure and are extremely popular templates in nanoscience studies. In this paper, the effects of different pore-widening treatments on the pore quality of the AAO templates were investigated. Results show that, through a highly controllable chemical pore-widening process at low temperature, different pore dimensions and diameters of the AAO templates can be easily achieved in a nanometer-scale way without changing the interpore distance. Combining with anodization voltage control, AAO templates with desired size distribution can be obtained, which will be extremely useful in template technology and masks for lithographic application. Also, silver nanorods/wires of different dimensions have been fabricated from above AAO templates after pore diameter adjustments. Such nanostructure materials hold high potential for electronics, optics, mechanics and sensing technology. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.