animate new muscles

[Daruma]

Hello.

Recipient of Face Transplant Shares Her Story and Results
（ New York Times ）

Five years ago, a shotgun blast left a ghastly hole where the middle of Connie Culp’s face had been. Five months ago, she received a new face from a dead woman.

Ms. Culp stepped forward on Tuesday to show the results of the
nation’s first face transplant. Her new look was far from the
puckered, noseless sight that had made children run away in horror.

Ms. Culp’s expressions are still a bit wooden, but she can talk, smile, smell and taste food again. Her speech is at times difficult to understand. Her face is bloated and squarish, and her skin droops in folds that doctors plan to pare away as her circulation improves and her nerves grow, animating new muscles. But she had nothing but praise for those who made her new face possible.

Who or what animates new muscles?

[svartnik]

The doctors plan to pare away folds on her face as her circulation improves and her nerves grow, animating new muscles.

The doctors wait till circulation and nerves develop - circuimstances which lead to animated facial muscles.

The part in bold is a result clause, a participle clause, which expresses one of the consequences of an improved circulation and interconnected system of nerves in the patient's face, for which doctors wait.

[svartnik]

Who or what animates new muscles?

The improvement of her circulation and her nerves' growth.