Congratulations to Khalil Ben fredj on his successful PhD defence on Bluetooth-based Bicycle-to-Everything Communication

Khalil Ben fredj from the Pervasive Systems group successfully defended the PhD dissertation “B2X: BLE-Based Bicycle-to-Everything Wireless Communications.”

The research explores how Bluetooth Low Energy can support wireless communication between bicycles and other road users, vehicles, infrastructure, and connected devices. This form of communication, known as Bicycle-to-Everything, or B2X, may contribute to safer cycling and more intelligent transportation systems.

Evaluating Bluetooth Low Energy for connected cycling

The dissertation investigates how different Bluetooth Low Energy parameters and configurations influence the performance of both safety-critical and non-safety-critical B2X applications.

The work focuses on performance indicators such as discovery latency and information freshness. Discovery latency describes how quickly nearby devices can detect one another, while information freshness reflects whether exchanged data remains sufficiently recent and useful.

By examining these factors, the research identifies both the capabilities and limitations of Bluetooth Low Energy for applications such as cyclist detection, collision warnings, cooperative awareness, traffic monitoring, and other connected mobility services.

An international research journey

The PhD research was conducted over four and a half years and was presented at several international conferences, including EAI MobiQuitous 2022, the IEEE International Conference on Wireless and Mobile Computing, Networking and Communications 2025, and the IEEE Vehicular Networking Conference 2025.

The dissertation was supervised by Prof. Geert Heijenk and Dr. Yanqiu Huang.

The PhD committee consisted of Prof. Ana Aguiar, Prof. David Klaus, Dr. Marco Antonio Zuniga Zamalloa, Prof. Karst Geurs, and Dr. Özlem Durmaz Incel. Their questions, feedback, and discussion contributed to a successful and engaging defence.

The Pervasive Systems group warmly congratulates our colleague on this important milestone and wishes them every success in the next stage of their career.