LONG-RANGE ATTRACTION BETWEEN A DISTORTED VORTEX AND THE SAMPLE SURFACE

It is shown that in extremely anisotropic layered superconductors ther e is a long-range attraction between the sample surface and a randomly distorted vortex line parallel to the surface and to the c-axis. In t he presence of strong random pinning, this long-range force attracts a distorted vortex line to the surface and may lead to flux creep towar ds the surface. The same interaction with the surface enhances the the rmal fluctuations to depths much larger than the in-plane London penet ration depth and might affect melting of the vortex lattice and evapor ation of a vortex line into independent pancake vortices.