Howard earned a B.Sc. in Marine Biology and an M.Sc. in Biological Oceanography from McGill University, followed by a Ph.D. in Systematics and Ecology (Limnology) from the University of Kansas. After postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Montréal, the University of Victoria, and Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans, he joined the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research in 1998. He has been there ever since.
His research spans the ecology pf the early life history of fish, zooplankton and ichthyoplankton ecology, sensory ecology, and the impacts of environmental stressors such as ocean acidification, ultraviolet radiation and anthropogenic noise and electromagnetic fields on marine organisms. He has published around 200 scientific articles and has taught numerous university courses while mentoring postdoctoral researchers and graduate students. Howard has had an active role in scientific publishing for about 30 years.
He has served as Editor-in-Chief of the ICES Journal of Marine Science since 2012 and holds editorial and ethics leadership roles in the Council of Science Editors and the Committee on Publication Ethics. In 2025, Howard received the ICES Outstanding Achievement Award for his contributions to marine science and to ICES.
