Carbon nanotubesNanotubes (CNTs) have turned out to be the important components in the nanotechnologyNanotechnology, especially due to their unique electricalElectrical, thermal, and mechanicalMechanical propertiesProperties. These cylindrical nanostructures were discovered by Iijima in 1991 and since then intensive research has been motivated by taking advantage of their propertiesProperties to apply in various fields, most notably electronicsElectronics and materialsMaterials science. Bioimaging in the near-infrared-II (NIR-II) wavelengthWavelength is emerging as a mandatory visualization modality in real-time exploration in fundamental biology studies and therapies (Yang et al. in Theranostics 12:7853–7883, 2022).