Atmospheric composition is controlled by the emission, photochemistry and transport of many trace gases. Understanding the time scale as well as the chemical and spatial patterns of perturbations to trace gases is needed to evaluate possible environmental damage (e.g. stratospheric ozone depletion or climate change) caused by anthropogenic emissions. This paper reviews lessons learned from treating global atmospheric chemistry as a linearized system and analysing it in terms of eigenvalues. The results give insight into how emissions of one trace species cause perturbations to another and how transport and chemistry can alter the time scale of the overall perturbation. Further, the eigenvectors describe the fundamental chemical modes, or patterns, of the atmosphere's chemical response to perturbations.