Sugars sense of zinc: A glucose-based naphthylimino conjugate (L) has been synthesized and structurally characterized. L has been shown to exhibit selective turn-on fluorescence towards Zn2+ in an aqueous alcoholic medium. The zinc complex, in turn, recognizes phosphates, nucleotides, and DNA by turn-off fluorescence, which has been further investigated by molecular dynamics simulations. © 2011 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.