Take positive volumetric flow rate in the direction of increasing . For an arterial pressure wave, the characteristic admittance of an arterial wave gives
The backward wave contributes the opposite flow sign. Write for each junction's complex pressure amplitude, suppressing the common factor, and put , , . The topology is the two paths and ; their intermediate and common distal junctions each have a hydraulic resistance. The coordinate convention in the source puts the upstream end at and the downstream end at zero in each segment. Consequently the wave transfer matrix of an arterial segment is
Equivalently and , with their continuous limits understood when .
Symmetry gives . Distal mass conservation and the resistive relation give
At , the incoming flow supplies both its bed and segment , so
Choose the incident amplitude at . If is the reflected amplitude in vessel , pressure continuity equation gives , while inlet flow is . Equating this to the two outgoing segment flows yields
Eliminating from these three relations gives the wave transmission through a resistively loaded arterial loop result
For large at fixed phase, and . Hence
These leading terms must not be used as nonzero denominators near a phase at which the normal intermediate flow vanishes.