Obesity and resistance to insulin are metabolic alterations that constitute major risk factors in cardiovascular diseases and type 2 diabetes. Frequently, they are present with other metabolic alterations such as hypertension, hypertriglyceridemia and/or hypercholesterolemia, giving rise to the so-called metabolic syndrome. We study the action of different agents of natural origin that are present in the human diet on metabolic and functional alterations characteristic of metabolic syndrome, with a view to their application as functional products.