Assessing cytotoxicity of boron nitride nanotubes: Interference with the MTT assay

Thanks to a non-covalent wrapping with glycol-chitosan, highly biocompatible and highly concentrated dispersions of boron nitride nanotubes were obtained and tested on human neuroblastoma cells. A systematic investigation of the cytotoxicity of these nanovectors with several complementary qualitative and quantitative assays allowed a strong interference with the MTT metabolic assay to be highlighted, similar to a phenomenon already observed for carbon nanotubes, that would wrongly suggest toxicity of boron nitride nanotubes. These results confirm the high complexity of these new nanomaterials, and the needing of extensive investigations on their exciting potential applications in the biomedical field.