  To facilitate new studies of galaxy merger driven fueling of active galactic
nuclei (AGNs), we present a catalog of 387 AGNs that we have identified in the
final population of over $10,000$ $z<0.15$ galaxies observed by the SDSS-IV
integral field spectroscopy survey Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point
Observatory (MaNGA). We selected the AGNs via mid-infrared WISE colors,
Swift/BAT ultra hard X-ray detections, NVSS and FIRST radio observations, and
broad emission lines in SDSS spectra. By combining the MaNGA AGN catalog with a
new SDSS catalog of galaxy mergers that were identified based on a suite of
hydrodynamical simulations of merging galaxies, we study the link between
galaxy mergers and nuclear activity for AGNs above a limiting bolometric
luminosity of $10^{44.4}$ erg s$^{-1}$. We find an excess of AGNs in mergers,
relative to non-mergers, for galaxies with stellar mass $\sim10^{11}$
$M_{\odot}$, where the AGN excess is somewhat stronger in major mergers than in
minor mergers. Further, when we combine minor and major mergers and sort by
merger stage, we find that the highest AGN excess occurs in post-coalescence
mergers in the highest mass galaxies. However, we find no evidence of a
correlation between galaxy mergers and AGN luminosity or accretion rate. In
summary, while galaxy mergers overall do appear to trigger or enhance AGN
activity more than non-mergers, they do not seem to induce higher levels of
accretion or higher luminosities. We provide the MaNGA AGN Catalog and the
MaNGA Galaxy Merger Catalog for the community here.
