| Summary: | The design and development of useful chemosensors for the ultra-trace detection of environmental pollutants and contaminants is a topical area of research. Herein, we report a new nanoscale emissive Zn(II) coordination polymer (<b>TB-Zn-CP</b>) for differential fluorescence sensing of various antibiotics in water. <b>TB-Zn-CP</b> was synthesized using a unique V-shaped green emitting 4-amino-1,8-naphthalimide Tröger’s base (<b>TBNap</b>) fluorophore. The structural and morphological features of <b>TB-Zn-CP</b> were characterized by various standard spectroscopic and microscopy techniques. The fluorescence titration studies in water demonstrated a remarkable sensitivity and differential fluorescence sensing properties of <b>TB-Zn-CP</b> for the fast detection of different antibiotics. Among different antibiotics, chloramphenicol (CRP), 1,2-dimethyl-5-nitroimidazole (DMZ), and sulfamethazine (SMZ) displayed the highest fluorescence-quenching efficiency and superior sensitivity in their detection. The differential sensing capability of <b>TB-Zn-CP</b> was also indicated by visualizable color changes. The Stern–Volmer quenching constant <i>K</i><sub>SV</sub> was determined to be in the order of 10<sup>3</sup>–10<sup>4</sup> M<sup>−1</sup>, and the sensitivity was shown to be at a nanomolar (10<sup>−9</sup> M) level. All these results confirm that <b>TB-Zn-CP</b> can be a potential and practically useful polymeric sensor for differential fluorescence and visual detection of different antibiotics in water.
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