diff --git a/odfdom/src/test/java/org/odftoolkit/odfdom/doc/UnicodeSerializationGh137Test.java b/odfdom/src/test/java/org/odftoolkit/odfdom/doc/UnicodeSerializationGh137Test.java
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+++ b/odfdom/src/test/java/org/odftoolkit/odfdom/doc/UnicodeSerializationGh137Test.java
@@ -0,0 +1,80 @@
+/*
+Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
+or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
+distributed with this work for additional information
+regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
+to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
+"License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
+with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+
+ http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+
+Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
+software distributed under the License is distributed on an
+"AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
+KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
+specific language governing permissions and limitations
+under the License.
+*/
+package org.odftoolkit.odfdom.doc;
+
+import java.io.File;
+import org.junit.Assert;
+import org.junit.Test;
+import org.odftoolkit.odfdom.doc.table.OdfTableCell;
+import org.odftoolkit.odfdom.utils.ResourceUtilities;
+
+/**
+ * Test for Unicode astral character XML serialization bug.
+ *
+ * @see <a href="https://github.com/tdf/odftoolkit/issues/137">GH-137</a>
+ * @author Daniel Gerhardt
+ */
+public class UnicodeSerializationGh137Test {
+  @Test
+  public void testSaveAndLoadDocumentWithUnicodeEmojiCharacter() throws Exception {
+    OdfSpreadsheetDocument document = OdfSpreadsheetDocument.newSpreadsheetDocument();
+    // content contains 🙂 emoji
+    String content = "text with an Unicode emoji \uD83D\uDE42";
+    OdfTableCell cell = document.getSpreadsheetTables().get(0).getCellByPosition(0, 0);
+    cell.setStringValue(content);
+    File destination =
+        File.createTempFile("gh137-test-emoji", ".ods", ResourceUtilities.getTempTestDirectory());
+    document.save(destination);
+
+    OdfSpreadsheetDocument loadedDocument = OdfSpreadsheetDocument.loadDocument(destination);
+    OdfTableCell loadedCell = loadedDocument.getSpreadsheetTables().get(0).getCellByPosition(0, 0);
+    Assert.assertEquals(content, loadedCell.getStringValue());
+  }
+
+  @Test
+  public void testSaveAndLoadDocumentWithGreekCharacter() throws Exception {
+    OdfSpreadsheetDocument document = OdfSpreadsheetDocument.newSpreadsheetDocument();
+    // content contains Greek 𝜈 (Nu) character
+    String content = "text with a Greek character \uD835\uDF08";
+    OdfTableCell cell = document.getSpreadsheetTables().get(0).getCellByPosition(0, 0);
+    cell.setStringValue(content);
+    File destination =
+        File.createTempFile("gh137-test-greek", ".ods", ResourceUtilities.getTempTestDirectory());
+    document.save(destination);
+
+    OdfSpreadsheetDocument loadedDocument = OdfSpreadsheetDocument.loadDocument(destination);
+    OdfTableCell loadedCell = loadedDocument.getSpreadsheetTables().get(0).getCellByPosition(0, 0);
+    Assert.assertEquals(content, loadedCell.getStringValue());
+  }
+
+  @Test
+  public void testSaveAndLoadDocumentWithPlainAscii() throws Exception {
+    OdfSpreadsheetDocument document = OdfSpreadsheetDocument.newSpreadsheetDocument();
+    String content = "simple ASCII text";
+    OdfTableCell cell = document.getSpreadsheetTables().get(0).getCellByPosition(0, 0);
+    cell.setStringValue(content);
+    File destination =
+        File.createTempFile("gh137-test-ascii", ".ods", ResourceUtilities.getTempTestDirectory());
+    document.save(destination);
+
+    OdfSpreadsheetDocument loadedDocument = OdfSpreadsheetDocument.loadDocument(destination);
+    OdfTableCell loadedCell = loadedDocument.getSpreadsheetTables().get(0).getCellByPosition(0, 0);
+    Assert.assertEquals(content, loadedCell.getStringValue());
+  }
+}