use strict;
my $str = '2-3
2-6
a-e
f-y
^-j
A-Z
A-E';
my $regex = qr/^\d\-\d$|^[a-zA-Z]\-[a-zA-Z]$/mp;
my $subst = '£';
my $result = $str =~ s/$regex/$subst/rg;
print "The result of the substitution is' $result\n";
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 Perl, please visit: http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html