Flux-line cutting in superconductors

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Abstract
The energy barrier for mutual cutting of a pair of twisted flux lines (prepared in a simple entangled configuration) is computed for isotropic and anisotropic superconductors by minimizing their total energy. The cutting barrier for the correctly curved flux lines is much smaller than the analytically calculated barrier for rigid, parallel flux lines and may even be negative, indicating instability of the entangled configuration. Vortex cutting is thus an effective mode of disentanglement of flux lines.