#!/usr/bin/env perl
use warnings;
use strict;
my $value = '"sample1\*sample2\*sample3*sample4*sample5"';
print 'original string: ', $value, "\n";
$value =~ s#\\\*#STAR#g;
$value =~ s/\"//g;      # now remove double quotes
print 'output string:   ', $value, "\n";

##</code><code>##

original string: "sample1\*sample2\*sample3*sample4*sample5"
output string:   sample1STARsample2STARsample3*sample4*sample5