If I change the assignment to @my_name to 
@my_name=("Acidovorax", "sp.", "JS42");

[download]
the program fails to find a single match. I doubt this is want the OP wants. The problem is that you're using different "word" definitions for "my_name" and "db_name". Either split both on whitespace, or both on \b, or it becomes trivial to find examples where the search is going to return the wrong answer. For instance: 
use 5.10.0;
use strict;
no warnings;

my @names    = ("Acidovorax JS42", "Acidovorax sp. JS42");
my @db_names = ("Acidovorax sp. JS42",    #data base of names in array
                "JS42 Acidovorax sp.",
                "JS42 sp. Acidovorax",
                "Acidovorax JS42",
                "JS53 sp. Acidovorax",
                "JS42 sp. Axidovorax",
                "JS42Acidovorax sp. "
                );

foreach (@names) {
    say;
    my %name; @name{+split} = ();
    foreach (@db_names) {
        my %copy = %name;
        delete $copy{$_} for split;
        say "\t$_ is ", (keys %copy ? "not a " : "a "), "match";
    }
}
__END__
Acidovorax JS42
    Acidovorax sp. JS42 is a match
    JS42 Acidovorax sp. is a match
    JS42 sp. Acidovorax is a match
    Acidovorax JS42 is a match
    JS53 sp. Acidovorax is not a match
    JS42 sp. Axidovorax is not a match
    JS42Acidovorax sp.  is not a match
Acidovorax sp. JS42
    Acidovorax sp. JS42 is a match
    JS42 Acidovorax sp. is a match
    JS42 sp. Acidovorax is a match
    Acidovorax JS42 is not a match
    JS53 sp. Acidovorax is not a match
    JS42 sp. Axidovorax is not a match
    JS42Acidovorax sp.  is not a match

[download]

In reply to Re^4: Reg exps? by JavaFan
in thread Reg exps? by Anonymous Monk

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.