Meiofauna refers to small benthic and interstitial organisms that pass through a 500 (1000) μm sieve and are retained on a 44 μm (or 63, 31 μm, depending on authors) sieve (Giere 2009). The majority of recognized phyla have meiofaunal representatives. Nematodes are predominant in most bottom habitats, and harpacticoid copepods and foraminiferans are secondarily dominant in many environments. Introductions on meiofauna are given in Higgins & Thiel (1988) and Giere (2009).
The International Association of Meiobenthologists (IAM) publishes a biannual newsletter, Psammonalia, and sponsors a triennial international conference. Psammonalia is published in June and December. The first issue of Psammonalia was published 10 November 1966 and was two pages long, and recently, No. 160 of Psammonalia was published in December 2013 (IAM 2014).
The purpose of meiofauna conferences has always been to gather researchers from around the world to share and discuss the taxonomy...