Abstract
The metabolic syndrome is today one of the global health problems; its risk lies mainly in a multiple increase of cardiovascular diseases and the development of diabetes mellitus type 2. Recently, a large number of data have been collected that have shown that compounds, collectively known as oxysterols, are likely to affect some pathogenic pathways of the metabolic syndrome (insulin resistance, endothelial dysfunction and others) in a variety of ways.
Oxysterols are a very heterogeneous group of oxygenated derivatives of cholesterol with wide pleiotropic effects. The article describes the mechanism of formation of oxysterols and their positive and negative effects relating to the metabolic syndrome.