Classical Strong Metal-Support Interactions Induced by Calcination in Argon Atmosphere

Supported noble‑metal catalysts are central to heterogeneous catalysts, yet stabilizing highly dispersed metal nanoparticles against sintering and deactivation remains challenging. Strong metal-support interactions (SMSI) can effectively stabilize metal nanoparticles, but classical SMSI typically requires harsh reductive treatments and is widely considered inaccessible on nonreducible oxides such as ZrO₂. Here, we demonstrate a breakthrough strategy to achieve classical SMSI on the non-reducible substrate like ZrO₂ with Pt by a calcination process in inert argon. Argon calcination generates oxygen vacancies in ZrO₂, which thermodynamically promotes support migration and the formation of a ZrO_x overlayer that partially encapsulates Pt nanoparticles. Molecular dynamics simulations further reveal that increasing surface oxygen-vacancy concentrations facilitate ZrO₂ migration and encapsulation. Explicit electron transfer from the substrate ZrO₂ to Pt is observed to induce an explicit SMSI. The SMSI formed in Pt/ZrO₂ substantially improves catalyst stability, allowing efficient and durable CO oxidation for over 100 h without noticeable degradation, whereas fresh Pt/ZrO₂ continuously deactivates. This argon calcination strategy is further extendable to multiple catalytic systems, establishing a general and operationally simple paradigm to construct classical SMSI on non-reducible oxide supports.