my $foo = '$@!#@#$^$#@^';
[download]

..and I want to incorporate it into a regular expression such that the characters of the string will be matched literally, no matter what characters they are.

ie

    my $bigfoo='aabbaaa$@!#@#$^$#@^bbabaaba';
    assert $bigfoo =~ /(a|b)*$foo(a|b)*/;
[download]

What is the correct way to interpolate a string literal into a regular expression?

Thanks,

-Andrew.