Porous boron nitride with a high surface area: hydrogen storage and water treatment

We report on the synthesis of high-quality microporous/mesoporous BN material via a facile two-step approach. An extremely high surface area of 1687 m(2) g(-1) and a large pore volume of 0.99 cm(3) g(-1) have been observed in the synthesized BN porous whiskers. The formation of the porous structure was attributed to the group elimination of organic species in a BN precursor, melamine diborate molecular crystal. This elimination method maintained the ordered pore structure and numerous structural defects. The features including high surface area, pore volume and structural defects make the BN whiskers highly suitable for hydrogen storage and wastewater treatment applications. We demonstrate excellent hydrogen uptake capacity of the BN whiskers with high weight adsorption up to 5.6% at room temperature and at the relatively low pressure of 3 MPa. Furthermore, the BN whiskers also exhibit excellent adsorption capacity of methyl orange and copper ions, with the maximum removal capacity of 298.3 and 373 mg g(-1) at 298 K, respectively.