Multifunctional nanostructured materials for multimodal imaging, and simultaneous imaging and therapy

Nanotechnology offers tremendous potential for future biomedical technology. Due to their unique characteristics including superparamagnetic or fluorescent properties, and small size comparable to biomolecules, nanostructured materials have emerged as novel bioimaging, diagnostic, and therapeutic agents for the future medical field. Especially, the combinations of various nanostructured materials with different properties can offer synergetic multifunctional nanomedical platforms, which make it possible to accomplish multimodal imaging, and simultaneous diagnosis and therapy. Moreover, the conjugation of targeting moieties on the surface of these multifunctional nanomaterials gives them specific targeted imaging and therapeutic properties. In this tutorial review, we will summarize the recent reports on the fabrication strategies of multifunctional nanoplatforms and their applications to targeted multimodal imaging and simultaneous diagnosis and therapy.