I'm not here to support or challenge any claims by NOD about MAQS, but I do know that mite treatment with formic acid is very strongly dependent on dosage and duration, regardless of the timing of the application in terms of the brood cycle.  I also believe that anyone can create their own formulation of formic acid and an adsorbent material, or polymeric matrix and achieve similar results as can be found using MAQS, but not without a lot of trial and error.  I even experimented with paper towels soaked in formic acid inside ziplock bags with slits cut in them, but I was never happy with the delivery.  Granted, I didn't spend that much time doing it.  MAQS may not be perfect but in my experience using them, the folks at NOD are doing a lot of things right. They have a thick polymer saccharide "reservoir" to hold the formic acid and the outside paper to facilitate wicking and diffusion (I would assume).  I would imagine they are constantly working on different formulations to improve it.  My guess is it has a much better temperature/diffusion profile than "meat pads" or solutions in trays placed in the hive.  I don't know that for a fact.
  And I don't doubt that formic acid treatments can kill mites in capped brood and I also believe it's going to be dependent on dosage and sustained vapor levels in the hive.  And even with MAQS those parameters are going to vary significantly given the variability of hive conditions and ambient ones for each application. 

Also plastic is not "air tight" no matter how thick it seems and every time you open up a bucket of MAQS you can smell the formic acid so some is getting out of the packages.  Also, I don't know the saccharide polymer, nor the outside paper but acidic degradation of the strips themselves might just convert a significant amount of your formic acid into formate over time. I know that the batch I got last September clearly stated a shelf life of 1 year if kept in a cool place.   

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