Curvature functionals arise naturally in geometry, physics and biology.
In this talk I will introduce the Willmore functional and supercritical
modifications thereof. Then I will study the existence and regularity
properties of the critical points of the supercritical functionals and
I will show how one can use them to get a new proof of a result of Leon
Simon on the existence of a minimizing Willmore torus. This is joint
work with E. Kuwert and Y. Li.