A Minor Merger Caught In The Act Of Fueling The AGN In Mrk 509
  In recent observations by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) as part of a
campaign to discover locations and kinematics of AGN outflows, we found that
Mrk 509 contains a 3$''$ ($\sim$2100 {\it pc}) linear filament in its central
region. Visible in both optical continuum and [OIII] imaging, this feature
resembles a `check mark' of several knots of emission that travel northwest to
southeast before jutting towards the nucleus from the southwest. Space
Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS/HST) observations along the inner portion
of the filament reveal redshifted velocities, indicating that the filament is
inflowing. We present further observations of the nucleus in Mrk 509 using the
Gemini Near-Infrared Integral Field Spectrograph (NIFS), from which we conclude
that this structure cannot be related to previously studied, typical NLR
outflows and instead embodies the remains of an ongoing minor merger with a
gas-rich dwarf galaxy, therefore providing a great opportunity to study the
fueling of an AGN by a minor merger in progress.
