  For an un-oriented link $\mathcal{K}$, let $L(\mathcal{K})$ be the ropelength
of $\mathcal{K}$. It is known that when $\mathcal{K}$ has more than one
component, different orientations of the components of $\mathcal{K}$ may result
in different braid index. We define the largest braid index among all braid
indices corresponding to all possible orientation assignments of $\mathcal{K}$
the {\em absolute braid index} of $\mathcal{K}$ and denote it by
$\textbf{B}(\mathcal{K})$. In this paper, we show that there exists a constant
$a>0$ such that $L(\mathcal{K})\ge a \textbf{B}(\mathcal{K}) $ for any
$\mathcal{K}$, {\em i.e.}, the ropelength of any link is bounded below by its
absolute braid index (up to a constant factor).

Geometric Topology