Currently we can only load 8bit and basic formats. It would be nice if there is at least one floating point image format.
Best is EXR - but its tricky because of all the sub-formats and layer layouts.
16 / 32 bit TIFF would also be an option.
Use cases range from importing elevation data to AOV render channels.
Related: It would be good if there is more mesh sampling data: MeshCP or faceID + barycentric should return UV data