A note on symmetric separation in Banach spaces

We present some new results on the symmetric Kottman's constant $K^s(X)$ of a Banach space $X$ and its relationship with the Kottman constant. We show that $K^s(X)>1$, for every infinite-dimensional Banach space, thereby solving a problem by J.M.F. Castillo and P.L. Papini. We also investigate such constant in the class of Banach spaces admitting $c_0$ spreading models, answering in particular one question from our previous joint paper with P. H\'ajek and T. Kania.