5-point energy minimization

Speaker. Richard Evan Schwartz
Date. 20.06.23 at 2:00 pm

Abstract. About 6 years ago I rigorously proved the “phase transition” that happens when you minimize the potential energy of 5 points on a sphere with respect to a power law. The answer changes from a triangular bi-pyramid to a pyramid with square base as the exponent passes some number around 15.04. Recently I re-wrote my proof to make it much more understandable. In this talk I will give some history of the problem and explain the main ideas of the proof.