THE MAIN OBJECTIVE OF THIS PROPOSED RESEARCH IS TO DEVELOP AND EVALUATE AN ECOLOGICAL NICHE MODEL FOR COCCOLITHOPHORE BLOOMS IN THE GLOBAL OCEANS. THE NICHE CONCEPT APPROACH WILL BE APPLIED TO SATELLITE DATA AND USED AS THE BASIS FOR EVALUATING THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE OBSERVED BLOOMS FROM OCEAN COLOR DATA AND THE PREDICTED BLOOMS FROM ENVIRONMENTAL DATA. THE DISPARITY BETWEEN THESE TWO NICHESPACES REVEALS IMPORTANT ECOLOGICAL INFORMATION ON THE CONTROLLING ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS RELATED TO OBSERVED BLOOM PATTERNS. THE DATA SOURCE FOR BLOOM OBSERVATION WILL BE OCEAN COLOR RADIANCES FROM NASA SENSORS AND THE DATA SOURCE FOR THE ECOLOGICAL MODEL WILL BE ENVIRONMENTAL PRODUCTS FROM OTHER NASA SATELLITE PLATFORMS.