In five-dimensional geometry, a 5-simplex is a self-dual regular 5-polytope. It has six vertices, 15 edges, 20 triangle faces, 15 tetrahedral cells, and 6 5-cell facets. It has a dihedral angle of cos−1(1/5), or approximately 78.46°.
It can also be called a hexateron, or hexa-5-tope, as a 6-facetted polytope in 5-dimensions. The name hexateron is derived from hexa- for having six facets and teron (with ter- being a corruption of tetra-) for having four-dimensional facets.
By Jonathan Bowers, a hexateron is given the acronym hix.
The hexateron can be constructed from a 5-cell by adding a 6th vertex such that it is equidistant from all the other vertices of the 5-cell.
The Cartesian coordinates for the vertices of an origin-centered regular hexateron having edge length 2 are:
The vertices of the 5-simplex can be more simply positioned on a hyperplane in 6-space as permutations of (0,0,0,0,0,1) or (0,1,1,1,1,1). These construction can be seen as facets of the 6-orthoplex or rectified 6-cube respectively.
It is first in a dimensional series of uniform polytopes and honeycombs, expressed by Coxeter as 13k series. A degenerate 4-dimensional case exists as 3-sphere tiling, a tetrahedral dihedron.