Short-read and long-read full-length transcriptome of neural stem cells across different stages of mouse brain development

During brain development, neural stem cells (NSCs) undergo multiple fate-switches to generate various neuronal subtypes and glial cells, exhibiting distinct transcriptomic profiles at different stages. Despite the extensive transcriptomic characterization of human and mouse brain cells at bulk and single-cell levels, full-length transcriptomic datasets of NSCs across different neurodevelopmental stages under similar experimental settings are lacking, which is essential for uncovering stage-specific transcriptional and post-transcriptional mechanisms underlying the fate commitment of NSCs. Here, we report the full-length transcriptome of mouse NSCs at five different stages during embryonic and postnatal development. We used fluorescent-activated cell sorting (FACS) to isolate CD133+Blbp+ NSCs from C57BL/6 transgenic mice that express enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) under the control of a Blbp promoter. Integrating Smart-seq2 RNA-seq and Oxford Nanopore full-length RNA-seq, we created a transcriptomic dataset of gene and isoform expression profiles in NSCs at embryonic days 15.5, 17.5, and postnatal days 1.5, 8, and 60. This dataset provides a detailed characterization of full-length transcripts in NSCs at distinct developmental stages, and could be used as a resource for the neuroscience community to study NSC fate determination, neural development, and disease.