A Tidal Disruption Event Candidate Discovered in the Active Galactic
  Nucleus SDSS J022700.77-042020.6
  We report the discovery of a Tidal Disruption Event (TDE) candidate occurring
in the Active Galactic Nucleus SDSS J022700.77-042020.6. A sudden increase in
flux of J0227-0420 during the second half of 2009 is clearly shown in the
long-term optical, UV, and NIR light curves. A plateau phase, following an
initial decline, is seen in the NUV and optical u, g, r, i light curves.
Moreover, we find possible evidence that the plateau phase in the NUV band may
lag behind the optical ones by approximately 70-80 days with also a much
shorter duration, i.e. $\sim$7-15 days against $\sim$40-50 days. The long-term
NUV/optical (after the plateau phase), NIR and MIR light curves can be well
characterized with a form of $L(t)\propto t^{-\beta}$, consistent with the
expectation of a TDE. The plateaus can be explained if the stellar streams
collide with the pre-existing AGN disk at different radii. Though the overall
fallback rate decreases, the material in the outer disk gradually drifts inward
and increases the local accretion rate at the inner region, producing the
optical and UV plateaus. The possible lag between the optical and NUV plateaus
can then be attributed to viscosity delay. The index $\beta$ of the NIR $J, H,
K_s$ bands ($\sim1.4-3.3$) is steeper than that of the UV/optical
($\sim0.7-1.3$) and MIR bands ($\sim0.9-1.8$), which may suggest that a certain
fraction of the dust in the inner region of the dusty torus may be sublimated
during the TDE phase. Our results indicate that, due to collisions between
stellar debris and pre-existing disk, the light curves of TDEs occurring in AGN
may show distinctive features, which may shed new light on the accretion
process.
