Expression data from human embryonic stem cells, progenitors, and differentiated neurons

Previous studies have reported that human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) generate dorsal forebrain, cortical-like neurons under default differentiation in the absence of patterning morphogens. Novel bioinformatic analyses of whole transcriptome data allow us to examine these cells' regional specification more comprehensively. Furthermore, these tools allow us to ask how well hPSNs mimic their endogenous counterparts during various stages of in vivo human brain development. Here we performed transcriptome profiling of hPSC-derived neurons (hPSNs) at multiple developmental timepoints during default patterning. Default differentiated neural progenitors and neurons were selected at successive stages of early development for RNA extraction and hybridization on Affymetrix microarrays. We sought to characterize the genetic programs involved with generation of default patterned glutamatergic and GABAergic forebrain neurons.