Interaction of supernovae remnants: From the circumstellar medium to the terrestrial laboratory

Abstract

The evolution of supernova remnants ͑SNRs͒ represents a useful and natural laboratory for gasdynamics studies. In this paper the results of several hydrodynamical simulations of the propagation and early phases of interaction of two SNRs embedded in a homogeneous interstellar environment are shown. In particular, the hydrodynamic evolution and collision of twin SNRs during their self-similar stage has been simulated using a two-dimensional Lagrangian hydrocode. In addition, the results of a detailed simulation that attempts to set the adequate conditions to reproduce the same phenomenon through laser ablation of two plastic plugs at the laboratory scale are presented. These results indicate that both large-scale and small-scale simulations display several common features that can be used to design an experiment aimed to validate the hydrodynamical codes. Of particular interest are the structures found around the juncture of the two colliding shells produced by the interaction of the remnants.