Potentials for almost Markovian random fields

A positive almost Markovian random field is a probability measure on a lattice gas whose finite set conditional probabilities are continuous and positive. We show that each such random field has a potential and in the translation invariant case an absolutely convergent potential. We give a criterion for determining which random fields correspond to pair potentials, or in generaln-body potentials. We show that two translation invariant positive almost Markovian random fields have the same finite set conditional probabilities if and only if one minimizes the specific free energy of the other.