The combination of high density, site selective nucleation, and size distribution control of semiconductor nanostructures has become a challenge in the development of effective optical and electronic devices. In order to build structures satisfying these requirements, various combinations of quantum dot deposition and nanolithography techniques have been developed. The AFM nanolithography technique has been applied on several materials opening a possibility to fabricate opto-electronic devices. In this Phd Thesis, we present a systematic study of growth of InAs nanostructures on pits produced on (100) InP by nanoindentation with the AFM. For that purpose, the AFM tip needs to exert a force on the InP that produces plastic deformation on the surface. The applied pressure between the very end of the AFM tip and the sample surface may be varied in a controlled way by adjusting some of the microscope operational parameters like set point, tip radius and cantilever normal bending constant. The ability to control the shape of the indentation pattern as well as the nature of the crystalline defects allows control of the selective growth of InAs by metal organic vapor phase epitaxy. We also report the fabrication of one-dimensional arrays of InAs/InP nanostructures. The nanoindentation is produced by dragging the AFM tip under constant force of the substrate, along the <100> and <110> InP crystallographic directions. We have observed that the number and the size of nucleated nanostructures are dependent on the distance between the lithographed lines. These results suggest that the growth mechanism of the InAs nanostructures on the pits produced by AFM on InP is not governed by the number of atomic steps generated during the scratching. Instead, the data suggests that, the density of mechanically induced defects, like dislocations and cracks, are responsible for the number of nucleated nanostructures.