The theoretical foundation for artery buckling under internal pressure.

The stability of blood vessels under the lumen blood pressure is essential to the maintenance of normal arterial function. Buckling equations have been established recently for linear and nonlinear elastic artery models with assumed sinusoidal mode shapes. However, the theoretical base for the assumption is not clear. This study established differential equations of artery buckling and then proved that straight arteries bifurcated into sinusoidal mode shapes when buckling occurs. These results set the buckling equation on a solid theoretical foundation.