$re = '/(const uint[138][26]?_t)(\s?\S+\s*) (\s*[0-9]*[xXa-fA-F0-9]*)$/';
$str = 'const uint8_t T_SYN_3 23';
$subst = "\1\2 = \3;";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str, 1);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$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