ENSO as a natural experiment to understand environmental control of meiofaunal community structure

The mechanisms controlling abundance and biomass of meiofauna in marine sub-littoral systems are still poorly known. The structure of a meiobenthic community is the product of an intricate network of abiotic factors, which interact with biotic factors like food availability, intraand interspecific interactions and predation (Giere 1993). In spite of this inherent complexity, the temporal variation of meiobenthic communities in coastal systems might be quite predictable in relation to seasonal variation of primary production (i.e. food availability) and environmental conditions (e.g. temperature and oxygen) (Coull 1988; Giere 1993; Olafsson & Elmgren 1997). Nevertheless, there