MoO3 center dot 0.5H(2)O nanorods were synthesized on a large-scale through a room-temperature aqueous chemical method, simply by using sodium molybdate and nitric acid as the reactants. The as-prepared samples were investigated by a variety of techniques, including X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM). The results indicate that the samples are monoclinic phase, and have diameters of 40-200 nm, and lengths up to several micrometers, respectively. The formation mechanism for MoO3 center dot 0.5H(2)O nanorods was proposed as 1D growth of the intrinsically anisotropic crystallographic structure. The as-prepared nanorod samples exhibited much better solar photocatalytic performance on degradation of simulated dyeing wastewater than that of their bulk counterparts. The possible reason for the improved photocatalytic performance of the nanorods is the size and surface effect of nanomaterials. (C) 2015 Published by Elsevier B.V.