Imaging technologies are used throughout the life and biomedical sciences to understand mechanisms in biology and diagnosis and therapy in animal and human medicine. We present criteria for globally applicable guidelines for open image data tools and resources for the rapidly developing fields of biological and biomedical imaging.

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Tumor oxygenation is a critical issue for enhancing radiotherapy (RT) effectiveness. Alternating RT with hyperthermia improves tumor radiosensitivity by inducing a massive vasodilation of the neoangiogenic vasculature provided the whole tumor is properly heated. The aim of this work was to develop superparamagnetic oxygen-loaded nanobubbles (MOLNBs) as innovative theranostic hyperthermic agents to potentiate tumor oxygenation by direct intracellular oxygen administration. Magnetic oxygen-loaded nanobubbles were obtained by functionalizing dextran-shelled and perfluoropentane-cored nanobubbles with superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles. Magnetic oxygen-loaded nanobubbles with sizes of about 380 nm were manufactured, and they were able to store oxygen and in vitro release it with prolonged kinetics. In vitro investigation showed that MOLNBs can increase tissue temperature when exposed to radiofrequency magnetic fields. Moreover, they are easily internalized by tumor cells, herein releasing oxygen with a sustained kinetics. In conclusion, MOLNBs can be considered a multimodal theranostic platform since, beyond their nature of contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging due to magnetic characteristics, they showed echogenic properties and can be visualized using medical ultrasound.

Ultrasound Contrast Agents (UCAs) consisting of gas-filled-coated Microbubbles (MBs) with diameters between 1 and 10 µm have been used for a number of decades in diagnostic imaging. In recent years, submicron contrast agents have proven to be a viable alternative to MBs for ultrasound (US)-based applications for their capability to extravasate and accumulate in the tumor tissue via the enhanced permeability and retention effect. After a short overview of the more recent approaches to ultrasound-mediated imaging and therapeutics at the nanoscale, phase-change contrast agents (PCCAs), which can be phase-transitioned into highly echogenic MBs by means of US, are here presented. The phenomenon of acoustic droplet vaporization (ADV) to produce bubbles is widely investigated for both imaging and therapeutic applications to develop promising theranostic platforms.