Casimir-Like Effect from Thermal Field Fluctuations

Landau-Ginzburg $\phi^4$ field theory is usually applied to systems for understanding continuous phase transitions at critical points. Here we analyze the thermal field using a similar free energy description from a statistical field theory perspective, and study fluctuations in such a field with a particular focus on realizing the thermal Casimir effect. Initially, we qualitatively describe the emergence of the Casimir-like effect using mean-field approximation and further derive it using coarse-graining of perturbative renormalization procedure in the vicinity of Gaussian-fixed point. These results may lead to further the understanding of the Casimir effect from scalar fields without employing the concept of zero-point energy in a cosmological sense.