Despite established cultures of coccolithophore microalgae and attainable large-scale production of coccolith biominerals (gram quantities of calcite mineral from litres of culture), the coccolith as an advanced functional material has made little progress in bionanotechnologies. This project will quantitatively describe metal doping into and on the surface of coccolith-based calcite for several transition metals, main group elements and lanthanides. Elucidating the potential of coccolithophore to incorporate metal ions into/onto biogenic calcite production will not only reveal the biotechnological possibilities for coccolith materials but will offer insights on the role of metals in the biomineralization process and the biological screening effect. Metal-doped coccolith materials will be subjected to physical and chemical characterization (focus placed on strategic metals that have enchanced incorporation into biogenic calcite or can be replaced/deposited on coccoltih surface). Select metal-doped coccolith candidates will be pursued for biotechnological application accordingly based on their physical and optical properties (e.g., catalytic activity for transition metals and photoluminescence for lanthanides).