The densest packing of 13 congruent circles in a circle (Q1403510)

The author investigates the densest packings of 13 circles in a given circle. More precisely, he shows that the radius of the smallest circle in which 13 points with mutual distances at least 1 can be placed equals \(\frac {1+\sqrt 5} {2}\), and that these 13 points have to be arranged in precisely two possible configurations each of which has a certain type of symmetry. A suitable annulus and, more general, a method due to Bateman and Erdös are used.