Genome-wide analysis of transcription in in vitro- and in vivo-derived motor neurons

RNA sequencing analysis of Hb9::GFP mouse embryonic fibroblasts, Hb9::GFP+ primary mouse embryonic motor neurons at day E13.5, Hb9::GFP+ mouse embryonic stem cell-derived motor neurons, Hb9::GFP+ mouse induced pluripotent stem cell derived motor neurons, and Hb9::GFP+ mouse induced motor neurons generated using transcription factor overexpression. The goal of this project is to evaluate the ability of directed differentiation and lineage conversion techniques to generate a bona fide neuronal subtype. Overall design: The goal of this study is to determine the level of transcriptional similarity between spinal motor neurons generated from pluripotent stem cells by directed differentation, spinal motor neurons generated from fibroblasts by transcription factor-mediated lineage conversion, and primary spinal motor neuron from embryonic spinal cord. In addition, we tested the effect of culturing ESC-MNs in glia-conditioned media. All neurons were generated using the same Hb9::GFP, C57Bl/6 background, and FACS sorted for Hb9::GFP.