Abstract

Medical imaging is one of the fastest growing areas in medicine and, within it, molecular imaging (MI) is an example of dynamic change and adaptation to technology and future. According to Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging, Molecular Imaging is “the visualization, characterization, and measurement of biological processes at the molecular and cellular levels in humans and other living systems". MI is intimately tied to the biology of the disease and shows a new bidirectional way: biology to imaging vs. imaging to biology. The main goal of MI is to search and define specific targets (biomarkers) of a given disease in order to obtain new tracers and therapies, being the final result the prevention and the diagnostic-therapeutic individualization (personalized medicine), required nowadays. In the past, biomarkers have been used preferently to distinguish both normal and pathological (malignant and non malignant) conditions, but now new roles are coming, as those to define the outcome of patients, to develop new therapies and to design new preventive actions.