A separation of living untouched neurons. The present invention provides the use of the cell surface antigen CD51 as a negative selection marker for neuronal cells and a method for enrichment, isolation and/or detection of neuronal cells comprising the steps a) contacting a sample containing neuronal cells with an antigen-binding fragment specific for the CD51 antigen coupled to a solid phase, thereby labelling the CD51 positive cells of said sample and b) isolating the non-labelled cells of said sample.