Shocks and Particle Acceleration in Supernova Remnants: Observational Features

The last ten years a number of observational advances have substantially increased our knowledge of shock phenomena in supernova remnants. This progress has mainly been made possible by the recent improvements in X-ray and Gamma-ray instrumentation. It has become clear that some shell-type supernova remnants, e.g. SN 1006, have X-ray emission dominated by synchrotron radiation, proving that electrons are accelerated up to 100 TeV. This is still an order of magnitude below 3E15 eV, at which energy the ion cosmic ray spectrum at earth shows a spectral break. So one of the major goals is to prove that supernova remnants are capable of accelerating ions at least up that energy. Here I review the evidence that ions and electrons are accelerated up to energies ~100 TeV in supernova remnants, and, in addition, the recent progress that has been made in understanding the physics of collisionless shock fronts and the magnetic fields inside supernova remnants.