Microwave cooking
Penicillin
X-Ray Photography
DNA (via wrinkly peas)

As to the humble gecko, robots exist that are used to scour, paint and inspect ship's hulls. They are very slow because they either use magnets or vacuum pumps to adhere to vertical surfaces. Using a derivative of the gecko adhesion principle would mean rapid movement and a 'sticky' that doesn't wear rapidly or require frequent replacement.

I'm personally enjoying life in the 21st century – without you apparently.

Many products you use today were "accidents" or the result of research just like this.

: )

Each piece of research builds on research done before it resulting in a collective understanding of our world that no one person could ever achieve on their own. Additionally, results from such basic research often spur entire industries (and fortunes) that produce products that we rely on in today's modern world. Wikipedia defines Serendipity as "the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely." For an interesting list of serendipitous discoveries in science, check out this wikipedia entry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serendipity).