$re = '/\*\*([\x{3041}-\x{3096}\x{30A0}-\x{30FF}\x{3400}-\x{4DB5}\x{4E00}-\x{9FCB}\x{F900}-\x{FA6A}\x{2E80}-\x{2FD5}\x{FF5F}-\x{FF9F}\x{3000}-\x{303F}\x{31F0}-\x{31FF}\x{3220}-\x{3243}\x{3280}-\x{337F}]+)\*\*/m';
$str = '**้
็นใ **';
$subst = "<b>$1</b>";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php