The behavior of dust particles in capacitively coupled plasmas with annular electrodes is investigated. With the application of modulated signals on the annular electrodes, the periodical potential wells can be produced and it can play an effective role on dust removing. We pay our attention to the relations between the dust removal efficiency and the modulated signals. It is presented that by increasing the applied voltage or the applied frequency on the annular electrodes, the dust removal efficiency increases significantly. It is also shown that with the increase of the dust diameter, the dust removal efficiency decreases. (C) 2011 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.