It has two constructed forms, the first being regular with Schläfli symbol {34,4}, and the second with alternately labeled (checkerboarded) facets, with Schläfli symbol {3,3,3,31,1} or Coxeter symbol311.
This configuration matrix represents the 6-orthoplex. The rows and columns correspond to vertices, edges, faces, cells, 4-faces and 5-faces. The diagonal numbers say how many of each element occur in the whole 6-orthoplex. The nondiagonal numbers say how many of the column's element occur in or at the row's element.[1][2]
Construction
There are three Coxeter groups associated with the 6-orthoplex, one regular, dual of the hexeract with the C6 or [4,3,3,3,3] Coxeter group, and a half symmetry with two copies of 5-simplex facets, alternating, with the D6 or [33,1,1] Coxeter group. A lowest symmetry construction is based on a dual of a 6-orthotope, called a 6-fusil.
The 6-orthoplex can be projected down to 3-dimensions into the vertices of a regular icosahedron.[3]
2D
3D
Icosahedron {3,5} = H3 Coxeter plane
6-orthoplex {3,3,3,31,1} = D6 Coxeter plane
Icosahedron
6-orthoplex
This construction can be geometrically seen as the 12 vertices of the 6-orthoplex projected to 3 dimensions as the vertices of a regular icosahedron. This represents a geometric folding of the D6 to H3Coxeter groups: : to . On the left, seen by these 2D Coxeter plane orthogonal projections, the two overlapping central vertices define the third axis in this mapping. Every pair of vertices of the 6-orthoplex are connected, except opposite ones: 30 edges are shared with the icosahedron, while 30 more edges from the 6-orthoplex project to the interior of the icosahedron.
It is in a dimensional series of uniform polytopes and honeycombs, expressed by Coxeter as 3k1 series. (A degenerate 4-dimensional case exists as 3-sphere tiling, a tetrahedral hosohedron.)
H.S.M. Coxeter, Regular Polytopes, 3rd Edition, Dover New York, 1973
Kaleidoscopes: Selected Writings of H.S.M. Coxeter, edited by F. Arthur Sherk, Peter McMullen, Anthony C. Thompson, Asia Ivic Weiss, Wiley-Interscience Publication, 1995, ISBN978-0-471-01003-6[1]
(Paper 22) H.S.M. Coxeter, Regular and Semi Regular Polytopes I, [Math. Zeit. 46 (1940) 380-407, MR 2,10]
(Paper 23) H.S.M. Coxeter, Regular and Semi-Regular Polytopes II, [Math. Zeit. 188 (1985) 559-591]
(Paper 24) H.S.M. Coxeter, Regular and Semi-Regular Polytopes III, [Math. Zeit. 200 (1988) 3-45]