This thesis is devoted to the study of HVPE (Hydride Vapour Phase Epitaxy) method of growing GaN and GaAs nanowires with and without catalyst. A systematic study of the influence of the growth conditions on GaN formation was performed in order to demonstrate the feasibility of this growth on c-plane sapphire and silicon substrates without preliminary treatment of the surface. We have demonstrated by VLS-HVPE the growth of the GaN nanowires with constant diameters of 40 to 200 nm and of length up to 60 μm, while they possess remarkable optical and crystal quality. The newly observed stability of the zinc blende structure for GaAs nanowires with diameters of 10 nm has been described by the VLS-HVPE process, for lengths of few tens of micrometers. The growth mechanisms are discussed based on the phase diagram and the physics of near-equilibrium HVPE using chloride precursors. For III-V semiconductors, the study allows us to consider applications related to long nanowires that, at present, are used only for silicon. This work shows that in the context of Nanoscience, the fast growth HVPE method deserves a wider audience and thus could be considered as an effective complementary tool to MOVPE and MBE processes for the controlled shaping of matter on the nanoscale.
