Willmore Energy and Willmore Conjecture

Book excerpt: This book is the first monograph dedicated entirely to Willmore energy and Willmore surfaces as contemporary topics in differential geometry. While it focuses on Willmore energy and related conjectures, it also sits at the intersection between integrable systems, harmonic maps, Lie groups, calculus of variations, geometric analysis and applied differential geometry. Rather than reproducing published results, it presents new directions, developments and open problems. It addresses questions like: What is new in Willmore theory? Are there any new Willmore conjectures and open problems? What are the contemporary applications of Willmore surfaces? As well as mathematicians and physicists, this book is a useful tool for postdoctoral researchers and advanced graduate students working in this area.