While the message began its voyage to the cosmos--a 24, 000 year trip to M-13, a cluster of stars in the constellation Hercules, to be exact--visiting dignitaries listened over a loudspeaker while each bit played as a short, high-pitched tone.

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But there is reason, according to recent studies, to believe the sun was once part of a very large cluster of stars.

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The Hubble Space Telescope recently spied a cluster of young blue stars surrounding a rare mid-weight black hole that suggests the black hole was once at the center of a dwarf galaxy.

MSN: Rare Black Hole Survives Galaxy's Destruction

"The fact that there's a very young cluster of stars indicates that the intermediate-mass black hole may have originated as the central black hole in a very low-mass dwarf galaxy, "Sean Farrell, of the Sydney Institute for Astronomy in Australia, said in a statement.

MSN: Rare Black Hole Survives Galaxy's Destruction

NASA-funded astronomers have located two planets located within a dense cluster of sun-like stars.

FORBES: Astronomers Find Planets Within A Cluster Of Stars

Each of the two planets orbits a different star in the Beehive Cluster, which consists of about 1, 000 stars located between 520 and 610 light years away.

FORBES: Astronomers Find Planets Within A Cluster Of Stars

While there are a number of different types of stars in the Cluster, each of the two planets were found orbiting Sun-like stars.

FORBES: Astronomers Find Planets Within A Cluster Of Stars