Research Article Miconia sp. Increases mRNA Levels of PPAR Gamma and Inhibits Alpha Amylase and Alpha Glucosidase David Mizael Ortíz-Martinez, 1 Catalina Rivas-Morales, 1 Myriam Angelica de la Garza-Ramos, 2 Maria Julia Verde-Star, 1 Maria Adriana Nuñez-Gonzalez, 1 and Catalina Leos-Rivas 1 1 Facultad de Ciencias Biologicas, Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon, Pedro de Alba, s/n, Ciudad Universitaria, 66455 San Nicolas de los Garza, NL, Mexico 2 Facultad de Odontologia, Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon, Eduardo Aguirre Peque˜ no y Silao, s/n, Mitras Centro, 64460 Monterrey, NL, Mexico Correspondence should be addressed to Catalina Leos-Rivas; catalinaleosrivas@yahoo.com Received 8 April 2016; Revised 2 June 2016; Accepted 12 June 2016 Academic Editor: Menaka C. Tounaojam Copyright © 2016 David Mizael Ort´ ız-Martinez et al. Tis is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Diabetes mellitus is a public health problem worldwide. For this reason, ethanolic extract of Miconia sp. from Oaxaca, Mexico, was selected in search of an alternative against this disease. Te efect of Miconia sp. on mRNA expression of PPAR on cell line 3T3-L1, its efect on alpha amylase and alpha glucosidase, lipid accumulation during adipogenesis, and cell viability on VERO cells were evaluated. Te mRNA levels of PPAR increased on 1.393 ± 0.008 folds, lipid accumulation was increased by 29.55% with Miconia sp. extract and 34.57% with rosiglitazone, and -amylase and -glycosidase were inhibited with IC 50 values from 28.23±2.15 g/mL and 1.95 ± 0.15 g/mL, respectively; the IC 50 on antiproliferative activity on VERO cells was 314.54 ± 45.40 g/mL. In case of - amylase and -glycosidase assays, IC 50 (inhibitory concentration 50) refers to necessary extract amounts to inhibit 50% of enzymatic activity. On the other hand, on antiproliferative activity, IC 50 (inhibitory concentration 50) refers to necessary extract amounts to inhibit 50% of cell proliferation. It was concluded that the compounds present in Miconia sp. ethanolic extract increase mRNA expression of PPAR, inhibit -amylase and -glucosidase, and increase lipid accumulation. It constitutes an alternative as adjuvant in diabetes mellitus treatment; therefore, we recommend continuing identifying the compounds responsible for its promising in vivo antidiabetic activity. 1. Introduction Diabetes mellitus is a chronic metabolic disease considered a serious global public health problem. In 2010, approximately 285 million people sufered from this disease and this amount is expected to double up within the next 20 years [1]. Diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM2) is the most common form of diabetes. It is a complex metabolic alteration characterized by an insulin combination resistance (IR, low sensitivity of one or multiple tissues to insulin) and insulin secretion alteration [2]. Te search for new drugs that act against peroxi- some proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPAR) is very important because ligands of these transcription factors exhibit multiple biological responses such as decreasing the IR and avoiding high levels of plasm glucose. It has been shown that the adipogenesis process is under the control of a complex cascade of transcriptional regulatory factors in which PPAR and other transcriptional factors of C/EBP family play a fundamental role [3, 4]. Enzymes -amylase and -glucosidase found in saliva and the brush border of the small intestine, respectively, act on hydrolysis oligosaccharides and disaccharides to produce easy absorption monosaccharides such as glucose. For the above mentioned, delaying absorption of glucose through inhibition of enzymatic hydrolysis of carbohydrates, carried Hindawi Publishing Corporation Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine Volume 2016, Article ID 5123519, 6 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2016/5123519