The Neoproterozoic is characterised by global environmental change and the diversification of many groups in the fossil record including animals and photosynthesising microflora. The cause-effect relationships between environmental and biotic changes are poorly understood but drastic events such as low-latitude glaciations, ocean oxidation and perhaps a bolide impact (on a more regional scale) may have had a decisive influence on the biota at the time. A new study on organic-walled microfossils (acritarchs) from the Murnaroo 1 drillcore, eastern Officer Basin, Australia, reveals the presence of assemblages with great morphological disparity, from the Officer Basin, and other sedimentary basins in south-central Australia. Earlier studies included only a cursory analysis of Edicararan System and both the uppermost and the lowermost acanthomorph zones in the Ediacaran biostratigraphic scheme have now been recorded in Murnaroo 1. Some species appear cosmopolitan, being know from Siberia and China, providing good potential for interrefional correlation and palaeobiogeographic reconstructions. The siginfiance of the present arcitarach palynoflora, in addition to being more abundant, diverse and covering a wider stratigraphic interval, lies in the fact that (in Australia at lease) it tightens the ejecta layer than previously inferred. In the aftermath of the global glaciations and the Acraman impace, the Ediacaran acrtiarch diversification may have had a profound influence on the evolution of other life forms, such as the Ediacara fauna. Full paper published in Science Direct - Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 139 (2006) 17-39