Ki-67 is one of the most famous marker proteins used by histologists to identify proliferating cells. Indeed, over 30 000 articles referring to Ki-67 are listed on PubMed. Here, we review some of the current literature regarding the protein. Despite its clinical importance, our knowledge of the molecular biology and biochemistry of Ki-67 is far from complete, and its exact molecular function(s) remain enigmatic. Furthermore, reports describing Ki-67 function are often contradictory, and it has only recently become clear that this proliferation marker is itself dispensable for cell proliferation. We discuss the unusual organization of the protein and its mRNA and how they relate to various models for its function. In particular, we focus on ways in which the intrinsically disordered structure of Ki-67 might aid in the assembly of the still-mysterious mitotic chromosome periphery compartment by controlling liquid–liquid phase separation of nucleolar proteins and RNAs.

Ki-67 是组织学家用来识别增殖细胞的最著名的标记蛋白之一。事实上，PubMed 上列出了超过 30,000 篇涉及 Ki-67 的文章。在这里，我们回顾了一些关于蛋白质的当前文献。尽管具有临床重要性，但我们对 Ki-67 的分子生物学和生物化学的了解还远未完成，其确切的分子功能仍然是个谜。此外，描述 Ki-67 功能的报告通常是相互矛盾的，而且直到最近才清楚这种增殖标记本身对于细胞增殖是可有可无的。我们讨论了蛋白质及其 mRNA 的不寻常组织，以及它们如何与其功能的各种模型相关。尤其，