In vitro experiments have demonstrated that neuronal-like cells derived from bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells can survive, migrate, integrate and help to restore the function and be-haviors of spinal cord injury models, and that they may serve as a suitable approach to treating spinal cord injury. However, it is very difficult to track transplanted cells in vivo. In this study, we in-jected superparamagnetic iron oxide-labeled neuronal-like cells into the subarachnoid space in a rabbit model of spinal cord injury. At 7 days after celltransplantation, a smal number of dot-shaped low signal intensity shadows were observed in the spinal cord injury region, and at 14 days, the number of these shadows increased on T2-weighted imaging. Perl’s Prussian blue staining de-tected dot-shaped low signal intensity shadows in the spinal cord injury region, indicative of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticle-labeled cells. These findings suggest that transplanted neuronal-like cells derived from bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells can migrate to the spinal cord injury region and can be tracked by magnetic resonance in vivo. Magnetic resonance imaging represents an efficient noninvasive technique for visual y tracking transplanted cells in vivo.