Abstract: Silicon carbide foam useful as a catalyst support has a BET specific surface area of at least 5 m2/g, and a compression strength exceeding 0.2 MPa. The foam is prepared by impreganting an organic foam with a suspension of silicon in a resin containing a cross-linking agent, incompletely cross-linking the resin, carbonizing the foam and resin, and carburizing the silicon.

Abstract: Catalyst support in granular form with a SiC&bgr; crystallite base and a high specific surface area having improved mechanical characteristics. The porosity of the support is between 0.001 and 1 um in size and the crystallinity of the support is determined by: a full width at half maximum of diffraction X rays, corresponding to plane [2 2 0] of the SiC&bgr; crystallites, of between 0.15 and 0.60°, angle 2&thgr; of Bragg's law; and a bidimensional peak height [1 0] corresponding to directions [1 0] normalized by the integrated intensity of the peak of plane [2 2 0] of between 0.15 and 0.40.