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Heusler compounds and alloys based on them are of great recent interest because they exhibit a wide variety of spin structures, magnetic properties, and electron-transport phenomena. Their properties are tunable by alloying and we have investigated L21-orderd compound Ru2MnSn and its alloys by varying the atomic Mn:Sn composition. While antiferromagnetic ordering with a Néel temperature of 361 K was observed in Ru2MnSn, the Mn-poor Ru2Mn0.8Sn1.2 alloy exhibits properties of a diluted antiferromagnet in which there are localized regions of uncompensated Mn spins. Furthermore, a noncoplanar spin structure, evident from a topological Hall-effect contribution to the room-temperature Hall resistivity, is realized in Ru2Mn0.8Sn1.2. Our combined experimental and theoretical analysis shows that in the Ru2Mn0.8Sn1.2 alloy, the magnetic properties can be explained in terms of a noncoplanar antiferromagnetic scissor mode, which creates a small net magnetization in a magnetic field and subsequently yields a Berry curvature with a strong topological Hall effect. 

The structural, magnetic and magnetocaloric properties of Fe deficient Pr2-xNdxFe17 (x = 0.5, 0.7) alloys prepared by arc-melting and melt-spinning have been investigated. The room temperature x-ray diffraction patterns show that the samples are nearly single-phase and crystallize in the rhombohedral Th2Zn17-type crystal structure. The Curie temperatures determined from the thermomagnetic curves are 302 K and 307 K for Pr1.5Nd0.5Fe17 and Pr1.3Nd0.7Fe17, respectively. The peak magnetic entropy change and the relative cooling power at field change of 50 kOe are 3.01 J/kgK and 345 J/kg for Pr1.5Nd0.5Fe17, and 4.31 J/kgK and 487 J/kg for Pr1.3Nd0.7Fe17, respectively. The absence of magnetic and thermal hysteresis with relatively high cooling efficiency suggests that the alloys have potential for magnetic refrigeration.