For patients with severe and profound hearing loss, cochlear implant (CI), a common and effective modality for restoring hearing, directly stimulates spiral ganglion neurons (SGNs) to generate electrical activity and form auditory perception. However, the postoperative outcome of CI is significantly influenced by the number of surviving SGNs, which is a key focus of preoperative evaluation. Existing audiologic function and radiographic tests cannot directly demonstrate the integrity of inner ear primary neurons. In this study, we developed and validated a radionuclide-labeled anti-vesicular glutamate transporter 1 (anti-VGLUT1) antibody-drug and achieved animal-level in vivo imaging of cochlear SGNs using nuclear imaging. By screening the public single-cell sequencing database, it is found that VGLUT1 can serve as a representative cell membrane marker for SGN in the cochlea. The potential of anti-VGLUT1 conjugated to the long half-life