Abstract: Electron beam-irradiation method was applied to prepare nano-sized nickel powders in aqueous system at room temperature and ambient pressure using polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and dodecyl trimethyl amine bromide(DTAB) as the surfactants respectively.The products were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD),ultraviolet-visible spectrophotometer (UV-vis),IR spectrum and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) respectively.The XRD analysis revealed that the relative pure nickel metal products with an average size of 12.6 nm could be obtained using PVA as surfactant,a mixture of nickel and nickel sesquioxide products with an average size of 25 nm was obtained using DTAB as surfactant.This suggests that PVA is prior to DTAB in the preparation of pure nano-sized nickel powders.