TITLE: Distributing points evenly on a sphere
QUESTION [36 upvotes]: I am looking for an algorithm to put $n$-points on a sphere, so that the minimum distance between any two points is as large as possible.
I have found some related questions on stackoverflow but those algorithms are not an exact solution more random distributions. For special number of points (inscribed Platonic solids) it is clear but how about 5 points for example. I would be grateful for hints to the literature.
Thank you everyone for your time.

REPLY [5 votes]: There is a rather comprehensive list of research articles about points on spheres and manifolds at https://my.vanderbilt.edu/edsaff/spheres-manifolds/
A nice paper is E. B. Saff, A. B. J. Kuijlaars, "Distributing Many Points on a Sphere", The Mathematical Intelligencer, Winter 1997, Volume 19, Issue 1, pp 5-11.