Pyrolysis of melamine/CoCl(2 center dot)6H(2)O mixture under Ar followed by acid leaching results in the formation of a large amount of bamboo-like nitrogen-doped carbon nanotubes (NCNTs). When used as a novel sensing platform toward fluorescence recovery assay for DNA detection, the NCNTs show a low detection limit of 5 nM and a high selectivity down to single-base mismatch. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.