The end-Ediacaran extinction is a mass extinction believed to have occurred near the end of the Ediacaran period, the final period of the Proterozoic eon. Evidence suggesting that such a mass extinction occurred includes a massive reduction in diversity of acritarchs, the sudden disappearance of the Ediacara biota and calcifying organisms, and the time gap before Cambrian organisms "replaced" them. Some lines of evidence suggests that there may have been two distinct pulses of the extinction event, one occurring 550 million years ago and the other 539 million years ago.
Most of the Ediacaran organisms featured in this image went extinct because of the extinction event.
The Ediacaran is a geological period of the Neoproterozoic era that spans 96 million years from the end of the Cryogenian period at 635 Mya to the beginning of the Cambrian period at 538.8 Mya. It is the last period of the Proterozoic eon as well as the last of the so-called "Precambrian supereon", before the beginning of the subsequent Cambrian period marks the start of the Phanerozoic eon, where recognizable fossil evidence of life becomes common.
The 'golden spike' (bronze disk in the lower section of the image) or 'type section' of the Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP) for the base of the Ediacaran System
The 'golden spike' marking the GSSP
Archaeaspinus, one of the members of the Ediacaran biota which is one of the representatives of the Phylum Proarticulata which also includes Dickinsonia, Karakhtia and numerous other organisms.