The formation energies of nanostructures play an important role in determining their properties, including the catalytic activity. For the case of 15 different rutile and 8 different perovskite metal oxides, we find that the density functional theory
(DFT) calculated formation energies of (2,2) nanorods, (3,3) nanotubes, and the (110) and (100) surfaces may be described semi-quantitatively by the fraction of metal--oxygen bonds broken and the bonding band centers in the bulk metal oxide.
