What are some of the most recent discoveries in Physics?

Answer 1

♠ being a physicist myself I have to admit nothing important was discovered really; all discoveries mentioned above do not yet give anything fundamentally new, they rather fill lacunas, proving special theory of relativity and quantum mechanics; E.G. The bend of rays was observed in vicinity of massive objects long before galactic gravitational lenses proving the same E=mc^2 and E=hf;
♣ mechanics/dynamics of Newton, Maxwell equations, atomic structure and the like are essential break-through compared to speculative black matter 1 and black matter 2;

Answer 2

I like the incredible discoveries of the last 10 years which increased the number of states of matter from the 4 classical:
solid, liquid, gas and plasma
to at least 6:
boson condensate and fermion condensate.

this particular states of matter occour at very very low temperatures (close to 0K= -273.15°C)
Matter at this low temperatures do bizzarre things, some of them are already known from at least 80 years.
For example superconductivity of some elements and alloys (recently even ceramics) and superfluidity of Helium, which will never solidify at 1atm, and when it reach the superfluidity temperature (around 4K) it will climb the walls of the container!
Recently superfluidity was observed in solids too

This new breaking discoveries revived the Cooper pairs theory of superconductivity (that became dead after the discovery of high-temp superrconductivity, where high-temp is -200°C of course), that after some cleaning and patching will become the base of the boson-fermion condensate theory, I hope in near future.

I remember a canadian scientist that stopped light, that is a boson condensate, but now I cannot find a reference.

There is good evidence that the quark-gluon plasma state of matter has been produced at RHIC

all references below:

Answer 3

I like sci-boy's list. Please add some of my favorites:

*Observation of dark matter in the collision of two galaxies (2006). Until this ocurred, dark matter was just a theory to explain why galaxies didn't fly apart under their own centrifugal force. [See source.]

*Gravitational lenses; where space has been observed to bend near super massive galaxies. Thus, we now have evidence that Einstein's speculation that space would bend under gravitational force has been validated. That is, space is a something, not a nothing, because gravity attracts it. [See source.]

Answer 4

Accelerating expansion of the universe.