$re = '/\'.*(["]).*\'/';
$str = '"foo"
\'foo\'
abc "foo"
foo "bar", "baz"
abc \'foo "bar" baz\'';
$subst = "'";
$result = preg_replace($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