$re = '/(\d)(-\d*\.)/';
$str = '1 0.00000E+00-7.52896E-04 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 1.00247E-01 0.00000E+00
9 2.57945E+00-9.98377E-04 0.00000E+00 1.80923E+02 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 1.08995E+03 0.00000E+00 0.00000E+00 1.00795E+01 1.00002E-01 0.00000E+00
18 2.37285E+00-2.20000E-01 0.00000E+00 1.81079E+02-5.53001E+00 0.00000E+00 1.30827E+03 2.01207E+03 0.00000E+00 9.87285E+00 8.64615E-01 0.00000E+00';
$subst = "\1 \2";
$result = preg_replace($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