A spherically symmetric model is presented for the interaction of a pulsar
wind with the associated supernova remnant. This results in a pulsar wind
nebula whose evolution is coupled to the evolution of the surrounding supernova
remnant. This evolution can be divided in three stages. The first stage is
characterised by a supersonic expansion of the pulsar wind nebula into the
freely expanding ejecta of the progenitor star. In the next stage the pulsar
wind nebula is not steady; the pulsar wind nebula oscillates between
contraction and expansion due to interaction with the reverse shock of the
supernova remnant: reverberations which propagate forward and backward in the
remnant. After the reverberations of the reverse shock have almost completely
vanished and the supernova remnant has relaxed to a Sedov solution, the
expansion of the pulsar wind nebula proceeds subsonically. In this paper we
present results from hydrodynamical simulations of a pulsar wind nebula through
all these stages in its evolution. The simulations were carried out with the
Versatile Advection Code.Comment: 10 pages, 9 figures, submitted to Astronomy and Astrophysic
