WATERTOWN, Mass. — Nocion Therapeutics, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company developing small molecule therapies that selectively silence activated sensory neurons, said it will present preclinical data supporting its proprietary charged sodium channel blockers, known as nocions™, as a potential new approach for the treatment of pain at the Non-Opioid Pain Therapeutics Summit being held January 27–29, 2026, in Boston.
The presentation will be delivered by Nocion’s Chief Scientific Officer, Jim Ellis, Ph.D., in a talk titled “Next-Generation Pain Relief: Selective Sodium Channel Blockade for Targeted Analgesia.” His presentation will highlight preclinical findings across multiple pain models that support the potential for nocions to deliver robust and long-acting analgesic effects with a favorable tolerability profile.
Nocions are small molecule, positively charged sodium channel blockers designed to selectively enter activated pain-sensing neurons through large-pore ion channels associated with injury and inflammation. Once inside these neurons, the compounds inhibit multiple voltage-gated sodium channels, including NaV1.7, NaV1.8, and NaV1.9, which are known to drive pathological pain signaling. By broadly inhibiting multiple channels, the approach is intended to address the redundancy that has limited the effectiveness of single-target sodium channel strategies.
“Pain is mediated by a complex and redundant network of sodium channels in sensory neurons, which has made it challenging to develop effective and well-tolerated therapies by targeting a single channel in isolation,” said Dr. Ellis. “Our preclinical work supports the potential of nocions to selectively access activated pain-sensing neurons and broadly inhibit the sodium channels responsible for aberrant signaling, offering a fundamentally different approach to pain modulation without the liabilities of opioids or traditional local anesthetics.”
Unlike conventional sodium channel blockers, nocions have limited ability to passively cross cell membranes or enter inactive neurons or non-sensory cells. This selective access is designed to preserve normal sensation and motor function while providing sustained inhibition of pathological pain signaling.
“Jim’s presentation reflects Nocion’s broader platform strategy to investigate the therapeutic potential of nocions beyond our lead indication of chronic cough and across multiple indications involving sensory neuron hyperexcitability, including pain, itch, and inflammation,” said Richard Batycky, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer of Nocion. “This work builds on decades of research by our scientific founders into the mechanisms that distinguish pathological pain from normal sensory function, and represents an important conceptual advance in the pursuit of safer, more effective non-opioid pain therapies.”
Nocion’s lead pipeline program is taplucainium dry powder for inhalation, a locally delivered nocion designed to selectively silence activated or inflamed airway nociceptors for the treatment of refractory or unexplained chronic cough. Topline results from the company’s ASPIRE Phase 2b clinical trial of taplucainium in adults with refractory or unexplained chronic cough are expected in mid-2026.
