Manganese oxide nanoparticles are synthesized by a chemical vapor process using manganese(0) carbonyl as the precursor. The synthesis temperature of the materials is varied from 500 to 1500 8C at 200 8C intervals. These nanomaterials are characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). XRD shows that the manganese oxide nanoparticles synthesized at 500, 700 -1100, 1300, and 1500 8C are mainly MnO 2 , Mn 2 O 3 , Mn 2 O 3 /Mn 3 O 4 , and Mn 3 O 4 , respectively. The TEM and BET results also confirm that the particle size is on the nanometer scale with a large specific surface area (SSA) of 81 -215 m 2 g À1 . XPS indicates the catalysts to have manganese oxidation states of (2þ), (3þ), or (4þ) depending on the synthesis temperature.