Post-Newtonian gravitational dynamics from effective field theory

Gravitational wave astronomy is rapidly maturing as a standard tool to study astrophysics, astronomy, and cosmology. However, to fully realize the promise of gravitational waves, accurate wave templates computed either numerically or using analytical approximations are essential, as exact solutions to the highly nonlinear Einstein field equations from which templates are derived are intractable for realistic systems. In this thesis, we present progress made in computing observables from an effective field theory framework of gravity applicable to the early stages of binary mergers. We first tackle next-to-leading order spin dependent contributions to the equations of motion in the post-Newtonian expansion, and use these results to derive adiabatically conserved quantities and radiative flux-balance equations, including for energy and angular momentum. We then compute the accumulated phase for quasicircular, spin-aligned orbits, an important gravitational wave observable, including subleading spin-orbit and spin-spin effects. We also derive the linear momentum and center-of-mass frame corrections, and compute the kick velocity for spin-aligned systems. Using these results, we present a mapping to corresponding results computed with more traditional methods and confirm consistency for spin-orbit and spin-spin quantities through next-to-leading order in both approaches. Finally, we present for the first time the second post-Newtonian corrections to the radiation-reaction equations of motion from the effective field theory approach. Matching between the near-field and far-field zones demonstrates the internal consistency of our results through 4.5 post-Newtonian order for nonspinning objects. Combined with the spin-dependent corrections, these results constitute important progress towards producing theoretical templates for generic orbits entirely within the effective field theory program at a precision needed for current and future gravitational wave detectors