Carbon‐Doped BN Nanosheets for the Oxidative Dehydrogenation of Ethylbenzene

Carbon-based catalysts have recently been demonstrated great potential for aerobic oxidative dehydrogenation reaction (ODH). However, its widespread application is retarded by the unavoidable deactivation due to the appearance of coking or combustion under ODH condition. Here we report the synthesis and characterization of porous structure of BCN nanosheets as well as their application as a novel catalyst for ODH. Such BCN nanosheets consist of hybridized, randomly distributed domains of h-BN and C phases, where C, B, and N were confirmed to covalent bond in the graphene-like layers. Our studies reveal that BCN exhibits both high activity and selectivity in oxidative dehydrogenation of ethylbenzene to styrene, as well as excellent oxidation resistance. The discovery of a simple chemical process to synthesize highly active BCN allows the premise of industrial-scale carbocatalysis to be explored.