use strict;
my $str = 'this is isolated is an example of this and that';
my $regex = qr~\b(?:is|isolated|somethingElse)\b~p;
my $subst = '#$0';
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