Brain/Craving Response to Smoking Cues After Oral Nicotine Pouch Use

Conditions

• Nicotine Dependence

Eligibility Criteria

Sex

ALL

Age

21 Years - 55 Years

Healthy Volunteers

Accepted

Interventions

• Oral Nicotine Pouch — OTHER
  Participants will self-administer one commercially available 6 mg oral nicotine pouch following overnight nicotine abstinence. The pouch will be used for approximately 25 minutes before participants complete the post-pouch cue reactivity assessment.
• Smoking Cue Reactivity Task — BEHAVIORAL
  Participants will complete a standardized smoking cue reactivity task before and after oral nicotine pouch administration. During each task, participants will view smoking-related and neutral images, complete guided imagination trials while holding either a cigarette or a neutral object, and undergo simultaneous functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to measure prefrontal brain activity.

Study Details

Oral nicotine pouches (ONPs) are non-combustible nicotine products that may reduce cigarette craving and smoking cue-induced brain activity, supporting their potential as harm-reduction tools for adults who smoke cigarettes. This within-subject, repeated-measures study will evaluate the acute effects of a single 6 mg oral nicotine pouch on subjective craving and prefrontal neural responses to smoking-related cues using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). Participants will complete assessments before and after nicotine pouch administration following overnight nicotine abstinence to characterize changes in craving and neural cue reactivity.

Key Dates

First listed

Jul 13, 2026

Start date

Apr 30, 2026

Status verified

Jul 2026

Primary completion

Jul 31, 2027

Completion

Aug 31, 2027

Study Design

Enrollment

45 participants (estimated)

Allocation

NA

Intervention model

SINGLE_GROUP

Primary purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Arms

• Experimental: Acute Oral Nicotine Pouch Administration
  Adult cigarette smokers will complete one experimental session consisting of pre-pouch cue reactivity and subjective assessments, administration of a single 6 mg oral nicotine pouch, a standardized 25-minute absorption period, and identical post-pouch assessments. All participants complete the same study procedures and serve as their own control for pre- versus post-intervention comparisons.

Primary Outcome Measure

Change in Prefrontal Neural Cue Reactivity to Smoking-Related Cues Measured by Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS) [ Time Frame: Baseline (pre-pouch) and approximately 25 minutes after administration of a 6 mg oral nicotine pouch (post-pouch) during the experimental session. ]

Central Contacts

• USC Nicotine and Tobacco Studies
  213-821-0807
  [email protected]

Locations (1)

Find similar trials in Los Angeles, CA

Related Studies

• Comparative Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics of Synthetic Nicotine
  PHASE1 · Recruiting · University of California, San Francisco · San Francisco, California
• Abuse Liability and Appeal of Oral Nicotine Products
  Recruiting · University of Southern California · Los Angeles, California
• Social Media Support Groups for Adolescent Vaping Cessation
  Recruiting · University of California, San Francisco · San Francisco, California
• Advanced Functional and Structural MRI Techniques for Neuropharmacological Imaging
  Recruiting · National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) · Baltimore, Maryland