An optical device comprises a cavity resonator and an intracavity ridge waveguide.
The ridge waveguide includes a monolithically integrated intersubband core region
and a nonlinear mixing region (NMR). In response to external pumping energy the
core region generates laser light at a first frequency and in a first transverse
mode. In response to the laser light the NMR generates parametric light at a second
frequency and in a second transverse mode. For phase matching the effective-refractive-index-versus-ridge-width
characteristics of the modes of the laser and the parametric light intersect one
another at a phase matching width and so that, at greater widths, the effective
refractive index of the mode of the higher frequency light is less than that of
the lower frequency light. For true phase matching the width of the ridge is made
to be essentially equal to the phase matching width.