preg_replace

```php
preg_replace('//\W|_/', '', '') // remove non-alphanumeric

preg_replace("/[^A-Za-z0-9 ]/",

preg_replace('/[^\d]/i', '', '') // remove non-numeric

preg_replace('/[^A-Za-z0-9\ \/\-\n\,]+/', '', $address); // remove non alpha + new line, space, some special char   
```